EDUCATIOJSr 

IN ITS EELATION TO MANUAL 
INDUSTRY. 



/^ 



ARTHUR MacARTHUR. 



a 



^ 



f^" 




NEW YORK: 
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, 

1, 3, AND 5 BOm) STREET. 

1884. 






Copyright, 1884, 
By D. APPLETON AND COMPANY. 



PEEFACE 



It is believed that a system of rudimental science 
and manual art can be adapted to the usual methods of 
instruction ; and although the teaching of particular trades 
is neither desirable nor practical in school-life, 3^et the 
time has now arrived when education should give the 
children practical knowledge in those general principles 
which relate to the trades and arts that are destined to 
become the business of their subsequent life. 

Had this book been written for those only who have 
specially studied the question, I should feel it necessary 
to apologize for so many details concerning industrial 
schools in Europe and the United States; but my object 
is to instruct the general reader, and elicit his interest 
by the results of experience. The mind is delighted 
with a logical demonstration, because it is so conclusive ; 
but a successful example is of much more value than 
the most confident affirmations or deductions. This is 
the excuse, if one were necessary, for giving a pretty 
full account of these successful experiments in industrial 
training. 



iv PREFACE. 

"What is industrial education? What are its merits 
and objects, and, above all, what power does it possess 
of ministering to some useful purpose in the practical 
arts of life ? Whether I have answered these questions 
with a reasonable degree of exactness and precision, can 
only be determined by a perusal of the volume. 



. -1 



OOB'TEll^TS. 



CHAPTER I. 

PAGE 

Industrial education neglected — The lessons of things — The education 
of children before the period of school — The understanding and the 
senses — The education of thought and language — Mission of the 
senses and physical organs — The eyes and the fingers translate 
the works of the spirit — Sensible objects sources of information — 
Cultivating half the faculties — Simple ideas powerless unless em- 
bodied in some form — The hand — Montaigne on the hand — Outis 
on the void in education — The senses 1 



CHAPTER II. 

Industrial history in France — Her skilled labor and prosperity — Art- 
schools and the excellence of her fabrics — British trade — Its effect 
on Europe — Schools on the Continent — The £cole immicipal 
(TApprentis in Paris — School at Besan9on — School of the Chris- 
tian Brothers — The J^cole professionncUe of MM. Chaix et Cie. — 
School at Creuzot — Count Hasrach — Weaving-school at Mulhouse 
and Epinal — Industrial education at Limoges — The Ecole des 
Arts et Metiers — Government aid to art-education in France — 
State aid discussed — Belgium, Germany, Bavaria, Wiirtemberg, 
Nuremberg — The French commission — Schools in other countries 
of Europe 10 



CHAPTER III. 

Industrial education in Russia — The Practical Technological Institute 
at St. Petersburg — The Imperial Technical School at Moscow — 



vi CONTENTS. 

PA.GE 

Exhibits of, at the Exposition of 1876 and 18 7 8 — Moscow fitly 
chosen — Two other schools for teaching trades to boys — Move- 
ment in England — Continental artisans — British artisans at Paris 
Exposition, 186*7 — Schools of art-instruction — South Kensington 
Museum — Walter Smith — French and English methods compared 
— Spread of art-schools in the United Kingdom — Their effect upon 
industries requiring art — Comparison of art-products — The lead- 
ing nation in the industries depending upon art — Advantages 
stated — The favorable effect upon the artisan — Favorable to mo- 
rality — The problem abroad 29 



CHAPTER IV. 

The United States — Dependent upon Europe — Want of trained skill 
— Our cotton and woolen fabrics superior — Pottery and other 
articles from abroad — The material produced in the United States 
purchased back — Russia and other countries — Art pervades all 
things — Political economy — Its maxims — American taste for luxu- 
ry — Cheap lands scarcer — Industrial classes must rely upon trades 
— Effect of making what we need — Adam Smith on home-trade 
— We should acquire skill — Raise wages — Raw material in the 
United States — Causes of national prosperity — Our natural re- 
sources — Practical education — Linen, hemp, wool — Other articles 
— Effect of training industrial classes — The value put on material 
by art — Its general effect — New England — Massachusetts— Arts 
and manufactures of — Education in — The Worcester Free Insti- 
tute — The Illinois Industrial University 45 



CHAPTER V. 

Technical schools in the United States — Massachusetts Institute of 
Technology — Manual School, Washington University — Stevens In- 
stitute of Technology — The usefulness of these in this country — 
Scheme of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and course 
of study — General Walker on science-schools — The School of 
Mechanics therein, and its course of instruction — Mr. Foley's re- 
port — Russian plan of manual teaching — The use of hand-tools 
still necessary — The Manual School in Washington University, 



CONTENTS. yii 

PAGE 

St. Louis — Its plan of teaching shop-worlc — Pennsylvania Museum 
and School of Industrial Art — Other technical schools in Phila- 
delphia — Science schools attached to universities — Agriculture and 
mechanical colleges under land grants — Some statistics concerning 
them — In order to be useful, they must teach by practice — The 
Massachusetts Institute of Technology a good example — Institu- 
tions for the superior education of women — The number of such 
schools in the United States — Every facility should be afforded 
for their education — Brief discussion on this subject — Their em- 
ployment as farmers, decorators, and architects — The numerous 
trades open to women — Emily Faithful's views — Industrial edu- 
cation of women — Equality of Education — Co-education — Should 
women pursue the old system of college studies? — This is a 
utilitarian era — "Victor Cousin on the fine arts — Auguste Comtc • 
on science — Other thinkers — The Greeks can be studied without ' 
studying Greek — Should girls pursue the same studies as the boys, 
in matters of superior education ? — Advantages of industrial edu- 
cation to women 62 



CHAPTER VI. 

Education for hand and eye — Method of instruction at Athens — Public 
schools — Improved methods — Main facts in regard to public* 
schools — Optimistic views of the same — Other lessons than those 
of the school-room — Statement of the same — Our obligations to , 
the public schools — Want of pi-actical education-.— Manual training 
a necessary part of— Foreign designers and workmen — Jewelers' 
Association — Speech at banquet of — Necessity of art-education to 
American artisan — Mechanic arts passing out of our hands — Rush 
for clerical employment — An illustration of their dependence — , 
Decorative art — Science appUed to necessities — Telegraphy, pho- 
tography, aniline — Artistic employments, their effect — Education 
enhanced by manual exercise — Eclectic education — The highest 
^ aim — Intellectual culture not alone education — Our physical con- 
stitution — Description of — Association of, in elevating the mind — 
In expressing its ideas in tangible forms — Their intimate co-opera- 
"" tion — Equality of education, the true method — Standard of educa- 
tion in Europe — Commensurate education — Duty of the State — • 



viii CONTENTS. 

PAoa 
Conclusions from, classified — First, second, third, fourth — Techno- 
logical education — Not for the mass of children — Object of studies 
— Right of the State — American Institute of Instruction — Use of 
tools — Reforms in matters of education difficult — Science in the 
colleges 96 



CHAPTER VII. 

The art of drawing — Natural order of studies begins with it — The les- 
son of things — ^Effect of, on industrial education — Indispensable 
in education — Massachusetts and New York — Branch of primary 
education in — Prejudice against it — Practical use of drawing — 
Exhibit at Centennial — French commission at — Experience at 
Taunton — Women's Art School, Cooper Union— Walter Smith's 
system — Drawing ought to be directed to the industries — Beauty 
of outline — It is teaching every trade that depends upon design — 
Involves easy lessons in geometry, botany, architecture, and his- 
tory — Geometrical drawing first — Ornament — Its almost universal 
application in the olden time — Then came utility alone — The 
working artist— Improvement of public taste — Effect upon our in- 
dustries — Mr. Outis's work — Drawing in France — French styles — ^ 
Expenditures for teaching it — The reason of her beautiful works— 
Great Britain — Her expenditure to promote the art of drawing — r 
Drawing as a branch of study in this country — Common schools — 
' The importance of drawing to various industries — Architecture in 
New York — Importation of workmen for building . . , .117 



CHAPTER Vni. 

The decorative arts depend upon principles of design — Their position 
between the useful and scientific — Their immense development — 
Roman and Greek decoration — Pompeii — Its uncovered orna- 
ments — Moorish decoration — Its magnificence and extent — Table- 
service for the President — Glass-blowers sent to the United States 
— Immigration — Skilled occupations of immigrants — The economic 
value of immigrants — Influx of cheap labor — Exclusion of Chinese t 
— William A. Carsey — An American mechanic on the tariff, cheap 



CONTENTS. 



IX 



labor, etc. — Cheap labor from abroad — Trades-unions limiting the 
number of apprentices — Growth of our productive force, and of 
our population — Skilled labor enriches our industries — " Sheffield 
is coming to America " — American steel exhibit — American por- 
celain — Palissy — Wedgwood — Gladstone's speech — Wedgwood's 
improvements — His beautiful productions — Palissy — Enameled 
pottery rediscovered by him — Our work in pottery — Our styles 
and workers obtained from abroad — Centennial vase — New branch 
of industry — Every potter should be a draughtsman — Drawing as a 
study — Colored patterns for cotton and woolen fabrics — The use 
of machinei'y in printing — Chemistry in that art — Value of draw- 
ing in it — It yields the grand secret of modern industry — Univer- 
sal practice of drawing in skilled work — Should be taught to all — 
The beautiful is overlooked — It is a universal element in nature . 136 



CHAPTER IX. 

Drawing (continued) — The Massachusetts act of 1870 — Want of teach- 
ers — Normal Art School — Current methods of teaching drawing — 
Professor Kriisi's views — Drawing as an intellectual discipline — 
It compels observation — Its influence upon the understanding and 
the imagination — It is an educational study 159 



CHAPTER X. 

Technical education of artisans — Art-industry — Industrial school — 
Apprenticeship — Trades-unions — Restriction in the number of 
apprentices — No restriction except want of character — Trades to 
provide technical instruction — University extension in England — 
American boys — Clerks and artisans — Manual skill and literary 
education — Duty of parents — Apprentice-schools in Belgium — 
Truth and knowledge 1'75 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER XI. 

PAGE 

Education of young artisans — ^Apprenticeship — Englishi legislation — 
Mr. Jevons's views — Adam Smith's opinion — Practically no ap- 
prenticeship in the United States — Technological schools in Europe 
— Trade-schools in Germany — Established by law — Supported by 
the state or local authorities — The school at Hamburg — Trade- 
schools the most interesting — The one at Barmen — Drawing in all » 
" the German schools — The school at Chemnitz — Schools at Vienna 
— Technical education in Switzerland — The great benefits thereof 
to that country — Opinion of the French minister in that country 
— The first industrial school founded there by Pestalozzi — These 
institutions in France — After the Crystal Palace Exposition — A 
commission appointed — Important changes — Classification of in- 
dustrial schools by Professor Thompson — Impossible to exemplify 
them separately — J^cole municipal d'Apprenlis — Account of the 
same — Visit of British Commission to the same — French industrial 
schools not national — ^cole Saint-Nicolas — School at Roubaix — 
Government support within two years — The republican govern- 
ment established a national system recently — Schools in Belgium 
— Those at Ghent, Tournay, Verviers, and the cities — Apprentice- 
school for weaving — Technical education in Great Britain — Letter » 
of the Chancellor — Views of Mr. McLaren — Report of the British 
Commission — Questions which arise as to effect in Europe — Is it / 
suitable for the United States ? — Universal opinion in its favor — 
Report of the British Commission — French commission of inspection 
— School la Villetie — Corbon, senator, upon the same — Tolain, sena- 
tor, on apprenticeship-schools — Industrial training the necessity of / 
the age — Good effect on the industrial classes — Opinion on this 
subject — Views of educators in the United States — Shall it be in 
the public school ? — Different views entertained — Dr. E. E. White 
— John E. Clarke — The necessity of this instruction admitted . 196 



CHAPTER XIL 

Education applied to industry in the United States — Impulse given to 
it — Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York — Mr. Auchmuty's 
contribution — Instruction in trades, common and decorative — 



CONTENTS. xi 

PAGE 

To turn out trained mechanics — New York trade-schools — Art- 
school at Trenton, New Jersey — The youth at the potteries — 
Lasell Seminary — A modified industrial school — Dwight School, 
Boston — Sewing-classes for girls in Boston schools — Excellent 
work by them — Art needle-work an industry — For house decora- 
tion — On ladies' dresses — Code in England — Schools for sewing in 
Switzerland — Germany — Bavaria — Drawing in embroidery — Dor- 
chester industrial school — Public schools at Montclair, New Jersey « 
— Industrial department — The order of exercises — Industrial art- 
school in Philadelphia — Mr. Leland's system of teaching the 
minor arts — Their great variety — Outlay for such a school — 
Practical results — It revives the popular arts — Useful to all — The 
Spring Garden Institute — Mechanical handiwork — Course of in- 
struction — Results — Technological and industrial training schools 
— At Worcester and St. Louis — Industrial home school at West 
Washington, District of Columbia — Cincinnati School of Design 
— A school of industrial art — New mode of industrial education ^ 
required — Reasons for the change — Subdivision of labor — The gen- 
eral artisan — Great advantage of — Manual and technical instruc--- 
tion the practical want — Appeal to the wealthy . . . .221 



CHAPTER XIII. 

Industry a matter of state importance — Schools for industry to be es- 
tablished by the state — Course pursued by Great Britain — Art- 
schools and drawing in England— EflPect of, on prosperity— Manual 
instruction correlated— How to treat the question— Not to be in- 
troduced into the school-room— Dr. White's and Mr. MacAlister's 
views — Schools at Montclair and Philadelphia — Manual training in ■ 
Europe — It improves the pupils — Public opinion— Conflicting 
opinions and objections — Statement of the same — Diversity of 
views— Mr. Stetson's — Dr. White's — United States' limited pro- 
vision for industrial education — Consideration of popular objec- 
tions — Instruction in the use of tools and machinery— Illustra- 
tions — Pursuits that resemble each other — Mechanical powers — 
Trades easily learned — Occupations will multiply — No danger of 
glutting them — Mode of industrial instruction — Moderate instruc- 
tion at outset — Pupils with a general knowledge of hand-tools 



xii CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

prepared for a variety of trades — Illustrated by Mr. Leland's 
school — A community of skilled workmen, its value — ^Further no- 
tice of industrial schools in Europe — Statement of M. Rossat — 
School at Charleville — Industrial training in French elementary 
* schools — School of the Rue Tournefort — The French act of 1880 
— ^Programme of the commission — Report of H. Tolraan, senator 
— Conclusions of the Boston committee — Views of Mr. Steel — 
• Important as coming from the right quarter 248 



CHAPTER XIV. 

Application of experience — Speculative improvement tardy — Franklin's 
discovery not applied for one hundred years — Industrial education 
in the United States rendered simple — Classification of industrial 
schools into three kinds — Each described — The developing plan 
of Ruggles — The one for teaching mechanic art recommended, 
and the reasons stated — Public education a fundamental maxim — .;- 
• It ought to be for the greatest number — Manual training in public 
schools — Law in Massachusetts — The great body of the people 
employed — Education should, therefore, form an ability for the 
business of life — Intellectual training at the expense of manual • 
and social virtue — Division of labor, and development of art — 
The children and their employment — Mr. MacAlister's address — 
Inexpensiveness of industrial education shown — Absolute necessity 
\ of manual training — Education at public expense — Reliance on 
the state — Form of government depends upon people — How chil- 
dren are taught — In an ignorant society man becomes debased — 
Education should be for useful purpose — Multiplicity of employ- 
ments, and the inducement to self-perfection — Training the great 
^ mass of workers a matter of life or death — Illustrations — Its 
proper place allotted it — Richard Grant White — Special trades 
not favored in public schools — Working-people not opposed to 
the manual element in education — The reason why they should 
not be unfriendly to it — Spring Garden Institute — Examples of 
working-men receiving instruction — Night-schools attended by 
working-people for studies relating to industry — Encouragement 
from extensive firms and corporations illustrated by an example 
— Opportunities for industrial education — Industrial establish- 



CONTENTS. xiii 

PAGE 

ments -wilHng to aid — Object of industrial education — Wendell 
Phillips — Lord Brougham's remark — Professor Smith's views — 
Views of the Boston School Committee — Expenditure in the J^cole 
municipal d^Apprentis — Effect on Paris — Graduates of our schools 
— Professor Runkle's views — Mechanic art of wide application — 
Confers mental discipline and increases the mental powers . .271 

CHAPTER XV. 

Question of expense considered — Cost of workshop at Gloucester — At 
the Dwight School, Boston — ^Estimates of Mr. Chaney — Mr, Leland's 
school at Philadelphia — Of the Industrial School at Montclair, 
New Jersey — Estimates of Mr. Royce — Of the Spring Garden Insti- 
• tute — Helpless condition of the graduate, growing out of an exclu- 
sively intellectual training — Natural substances are fitted by indus- 
try for use — Cost of support for public schools — Object of educa- 
tion — Manual skill and knowledge — High-schools — Professor ' 
Eunkle's remarks upon high-schools — Manual training ; its ad- 
vantages — Mechanical art — Multiplicity of talent — The benefit of 
generalizing illustrated by botany and chemistry — Applied to me- 
chanic art — Drawing in all art — Generalizing tools — The use of 
machinery — Has not superseded the necessity for skilled work- 
men — Machinery has multiplied employments — Illustrations of 
the power-loom, printing-press, steam-engine, and cotton-gin — 
I, Effects of machinery in reducing prices and increasing conven- 
iences — The demand for perfection of workmanship — ^Examples 
of well-paid skill — Inventions and industrial ambition — The 
forces of matter made useful — Machine-tools — Hand-skill still 
required — Building, carriage-making, etc. — The useful arts co- 
operative — The use of machinery not art — The trained artisan 
thinks while he works — Connection of science with useful art — 
The mechanic the true demonstrator — Science-schools in Great 
Britain — In the United States — In public schools — Education in 
the rudiments of science a necessity — Laboratories and work- 
shops attached to high-schools — Not to teach a particular trade, 
but the underlying principles of all trades — Objection answered — 
System illustrated — Mr. Magnus — City and Guilds of London In- 
stitute — Finsbury Technical College — The system adapted to our 
public schools 296 



XIV CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

PAGK 

Chemistry as an industrial science — Its necessity in the art of dyeing 
— Colors elaborated by chemists — Those derived from coal-tar — 
Its use in the fine arts and in other industries — Mathematics illus- 
trated in the useful arts — Views of Herbert Spencer and Dr. Dick 

' — Hydrostatics — Principles of the law of fluids and their application 
to industrial purposes — Electricity as a mechanical agent — Its sub- 
serviency to man's direction — Its wide diffusion and power — Prog- 
ress made, and the new arts to which it is applied — Geology and 
mineralogy — Geological deductions — Irregularities in formation 
and their study — Various facts of the science set forth, which 
have been applied to artificial uses — Mineral wealth of the United 

I States — Methodical study in our schools — The division of labor — 
Applied in every branch of industry, especially where machinery is 
used — If one has been educated in the mechanic art, he is not likely 
to become a machine — Technic knowledge opens access to many 
occupations — The invention of labor-saving machines frequent in 
this country — Universal education, its advantages — American in- 
ventions — London " Times " on the exhibit at the Paris Exposition, 
181S — Those in general use — Causes of inventive activity — Clas- 
i sical learning, a digression — Amherst — The English language — 
^ Greek and Latin should not take all the time and space — True 
knowledge not to be sacrificed to verbalism — The ingenuity of the 
people is a national characteristic — Plan of education at Athens — 
Rome — In Germany — In France— England — Scotland — Lord Bacon 
and Locke — Bede and Alcuin — Mechanical training to develop our 
capacities — The effect of machinery upon the condition of the 
working-man — ^Various instances cited — Does it dispense with his 
vocation ? — Agricultural implements — The railroad — Iron ships — 
Improvements give more and finer work than they displace — Ma- 
chinery depends upon scientific principles — A knowledge of these 
important to the artisan who fabricates them — The study of me- 
chanic art indispensable — Industrial instruction — England and 
France — It is a public question — It is a mistake to wait for local 
industries to begin the educational work — Wealth, population, 
and intelligence 321 



CONTENTS. XY 



CHAPTER XYir. 

PAGE 

Moral influence of industry — West Philadelphia Penitentiary — Criminal 
' statistics — Necessity of manual training to correct degrading 
views of labor — Also as preparatory for the safety of society — 
Advantages of industrial education to workmen — It improves their 
condition and cultivates the moral affections — Early impressions — 
Mr. Richards's views — Exclusive intellectual training creates a 

^ disdain for labor — The connection between idleness and vice — 
Public schools progressive — The friends of industrial education 
should vindicate the public schools for their reconstructing tend- 
ency — Mr. Eraser's report to the British Government — The im- 
provement of public schools since that time — The education of 
Indians — Hampton Institute — It is an industrial school — Indians 
taught trades — The best way to educate and civilize them — 
' Manual training as an antidote to over-study — Dr. Richardson's 
views — Boston committee on the subject — The Industrial Home 
School at Washington — The effect of skill in workmanship upon 
the condition of the workers — Science and art mutually aid each 
other — The laboring artist reappears — The estabUshment of 
Messrs. Minton — " L'Art Revue " — Fine art in the United States 
— Production in art-industry — Its humanizing influence — Art and 
science — Mental industry and material industry in close alliance — 
The worker is rising higher and higher, and is gaining in intel- 
lectual enjoyment — Industrial education the working-man's best 
friend 344 



APPENDIX. 

Extract from the Annual Catalogue, 1881-'82, of the School for Man- 
ual Instruction of Washington University, St, Louis, referred to in 
Chapter V 367 

Appendix Second to Chapter V . 3*75 



CHAPTEE I. 

Industrial education neglected — The lessons of things — The education of 
children before the period of school — The understanding and the senses 
— The education of thought and language — Mission of the senses and 
physical organs — The eyes and the fingers translate the works of the 
spirit — Sensible objects sources of information — Cultivating half the 
faculties — Simple ideas powerless unless embodied in some form — The 
hand — Montaigne on the hand — Outis on the void in education — The 
senses. 

'No discussion regarding tlie useful pursuits of life 
can take place at present without an emphatic recogni- 
tion of the claims of industrial education. When we 
consider that all labor is now directed bj knowledge, and 
must continue to be so still more in the future, we maj 
be sensible of some surprise at the little effort made in 
our educational system to meet this want. It will be 
generally admitted that an educated person should gain 
assistance from his studies when he comes to earn a live- 
lihood. But our boys and girls, for the most part, have 
no occupation, and are fit for none when they leave 
school. They know enough, but can do nothing; they 
have learning, but no capacity. The industrial pursuits 
of life, upon which the whole fabric of society reposes, 
are quite ignored. Education is bestowed upon the mind, 
while all the executive functions of the physical system 
are neglected. These executive functions are certainly 



2 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

as important as a knowledge of geography, spelling, de- 
fining, and grammar, of which the details are so often 
without interest, and do not in any way develop the 
faculties that deal with the realities of life ; nor do such 
studies enable the pupils to speak of anything belonging 
to any calling, pursuit, or manufactured article on earth. 
It would seem from our system of public instruction that 
there existed no such pursuits as that by which men can 
earn a living, no employment which requires manual skill 
of any kind, and no such things in the world as machines 
and tools and applied science except as mere figures of 
speech. To graduate one taught to think only, is like 
sending a ship to sea in charge of a navigator without a 
pilot, or a single person on board who can understand or 
execute his commands. Mental improvement is an inap- 
preciable blessing, but do not the eye and the hand im- 
prove the earth and fill the world with comfort and 
beauty? Man was endowed with both to subdue the 
earth, and a proper education necessarily includes the 
cultivation of a taste for lessons in regard to things as 
well as ideas. Our earliest education is a sensible one, 
and adapted to our condition. Our first teachers and 
masters in philosophy are our hands, our eyes, and our 
sensations. The facts communicated to the child by ex- 
perience may seem to be acquired rather by the opera- 
tions of instinct than of intellect, but the term education 
is as applicable to this training as to the formal teaching 
of the school. Whatever he sees, or hears, or feels, 
teaches him a thousand things necessary to a narrow set 
of exigencies, and gives him the mastery of his limited 
necessities. He learns to speak after his first or second 
year, and acquires grammar before he can say his alpha- 



CHILDHOOD AND PHILOSOPHY. 3 

bet. He can hear with understanding much that is said, 
and comprehends the duty of obedience. He knows the 
effect of heat and cold, and many of the mechanical 
properties of the atmosphere. Trees and herbs and flow- 
ers are distinguished ; birds and beasts are recognized, 
and all sensible objects draw forth questions which dis- 
play observation and reflection ; and, in fact, he acts in- 
telligently upon a great variety of ideal objects. He 
can appreciate moral precepts, and understands the differ- 
ence between kindness, honesty and truth, and fraud, 
deceit and profanity. In fact, many of the intellectual 
habits of life are formed in childhood ; and what he 
learns of useful truths and their practical application 
often exercises an influence for good or evil over his sub- 
sequent conduct. This is the natural method adopted by 
Froebel for training children, and consists in learning the 
reality of things. 

Philosophy teaches that mental perceptions depend 
upon the senses, and that the faculty of understanding 
objective phenomena is in the mind. Without the senses 
no object would come into the mind, and without the 
mind no object would be understood by the senses. The 
latter can not think, and the former can not perceive. In 
no other way than by the united operation of both can 
knowledge arise. We can thus acknowledge the elements 
contributed by each to our improvement, and that no use 
of the understanding is possible until it can represent it- 
self in the different objects upon which the hand of labor 
is employed ; for the mere existence of an idea or thought 
will never give birth to a concrete form corresponding to 
it, except by the aid of manual skill. This is the condition 
upon which all improvement or progress depends, and 



4 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

would seem to suggest the adequate preparation of both 
sense and mind for the common work. Such, however, has 
not been the course of education. Thought requires the 
power of language to express its intelligence, and without 
words spoken or written, mental operations, it has been 
held, would have no mode of representation; and it is 
upon the co-activitj of these faculties — thought and lan- 
guage — alone that education has mainly concerned itself. 
The whole system has, therefore, mostly been the edu- 
cation in language. This partial and one-sided method 
overlooks the simple fact that words are but the symbols 
of realities ; whereas our vague and indefinite impressions 
become fixed and palpable only through the employment 
of manual skill and mechanical art, by which also the 
imagination, the memory, invention, and emotion, mani- 
fest their marvelous and enduring eifects. To convey 
the images of external things to the mental faculties, and 
to work out the thoughts created in the mind, is the mis- 
sion of our physical organs. Thus it is that there is car- 
ried on between the external and the internal a perpet- 
ual correspondence, and the work goes on inside and 
outside much of the time quite independently of our 
wishes or our feelings. This mutual relation is upon 
the principle that whatever adds to the improvement and 
strength of one will fortify and elevate the other. The 
eyes and the fingers translate the works of the spirit, and 
mingle with its thought in the form of useful and beau- 
tiful objects. This is the lesson of things which play 
nearly the whole role of human experience. Figures, 
the stars, music, and all sensible objects, are»means of sen- 
sible information. What would the eye of the astrono- 
mer be worth, unless trained to watch the heavens with 



LESSONS OF THINGS. 5 

an artificial vision to which that of the eagle can not be 
compared? What would geometry profit if w^e could 
handle nothing solid, round, square, or in some other 
form besides the lines and curves wdiicli the eye alone 
can perceive? What effect would music have upon the 
soul were it not for the harmonious quality of the ear ? 
Or, how could we learn anything of botany without 
going among the herbs and visiting the trees ? There are 
no formal lessons in this, little or no didactic teaching. 
Objects are conveyed to the intelligence which excite re- 
flection and thought, and these again are wrought by the 
skill of man's physical powers into all the multitudinous 
utilities of practical life. Does not this community of 
labor suggest equality of education? A cultivation ob- 
tained at the expense of one half of the faculties which 
are no less important in working out our life, is a vain 
effort at the perfection of our nature. A culture gained 
in one respect by the sacrifice of all else can never be 
anything but a failure, for it is a serious drawback to the 
educational system, and to the mind itself which receives 
this preference. 

The metaphysicians tell us that the world is governed 
by ideas. This is a pleasing metaphor for the suggestions 
of pliilosophy. Common sense teaches that ideas have 
little potency until they are incarnated in deeds by the 
industrious hand of man. The bare idea of steam ex- 
pansion hobbled along for thousands of years, until the 
engine of Watt converted it into the greatest power that 
ever swayed the world. So of the steamboat, the loco- 
motive, the cotton-gin, the power-loom, and hundreds of 
other inventions that have revolutionized society, and in 
which practical mechanics have won a herculean victory 



6 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

almost single-handed and alone. The essence of power 
exists in the mind, but without any showing or influence 
when it lacks executive capacity, which dwells in the or- 
gans of the physical frame, and above all in the arm, the 
hand, and the technic skill of the fingers. 

Man is a living force, a fountain of ideas. The organs 
of the physical frame correspond to those of his mind, 
and are parts of the same equipment. He has two arms 
and hands and eyes, and the conception of power without 
them is weakness. Thoughts are demonstrated by deeds, 
and the hands and arms are the instruments which re- 
deem this weakness and give us the idea embodied in 
experience. 

The hand is a remarkable example of sinewy power 
and muscular delicacy of touch, and when its skill co- 
ordinates with the eye and the will, many of its acts im- 
press us with profound admiration. It i3roduces results 
so fine and delicate, that it seems as if the spirit itself 
passed into the variously-formed objects of its exquisite 
perfections. 

The hand intellectualizes the body. In a certain sense 
the mind itself is dependent upon it. All fineness of 
work comes from its sublime possibilities for high labor. 
Everything that proceeds out of the infinite delicacy of 
our nature requires its service. 

We are indebted to the eye for the perception of ex- 
ternal objects in regard to form and color. The hand 
also aids the eye to attain the same end, and while the 
eye is situated to insure the widest range of sight, the 
hand is docile to the command of the mind, and com- 
bines and transforms its ideas and sentiments into visible 
objects. In instrumental music it exercises 



THE HAND. 7 

" The matchless skill, the potent art that brings 
Yoices of earth or heaven from those mute strings." 

Says a recent writer : " So much does the power and 
dominion of man over inferior animals, crude materials, 
and natural forces depend upon the hand that, were it 
possible to deprive the human race of this important 
member and put in its stead a mere j)aw or hoof, it might 
well be asserted that man would soon find a common level 
with the beasts, notwithstanding his superior intellect." 

This extract illustrates in a striking manner the con- 
dition we should be in without the use of this member of 
our body. Man would be worse off than a savage and more 
imbecile than the beasts. With its aid the mind subdues 
the ferocities of nature to the wants of the spirit. It is 
the symbol of man's power, for while the head wears the 
crown the hand holds the scepter. The ancients endowed 
it with intelligent qualities, and foretold the future by its 
inspection — the gift of prophecy. It grasps all instru- 
ments for our progress, from the pen to the plowshare. 
Its wonderful precision, quickness, dexterity, and discrimi- 
nation come from an anatomical organization of muscles, 
levers and pulleys which enables it to perform its number- 
less operations in the service of man. The finest machinery 
and inventions fall short of its cunning ; and without its 
ingenious manipulations the comforts of civihzed life 
would disappear out of the industries of mankind. It has 
even a language of its own. Says Montaigne : "Would 
you think it ? With our very hands we require, promise, 
call, dismiss, threaten, supplicate, deny, interrogate, ad- 
mire, number, confer, repent, fear, confound, doubt, in- 
struct, command, incite, encourage, swear, testify, accuse, 
condemn, absolve, affront, despise, defy, provoke, flatter^ 



8 EDUCATION IX ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

applaud, bless, humble, mock, reconcile, recommend, exalt, 
entertain, rejoice, complain, refuse, despair, wonder, ex- 
claim, keep silence, and what not ; and all this with a varia- 
tion and multiplication even to the emulation of speech." 

Mr. Outis, in his book on " The Yoid in Modern Edu- 
cation," declares that the great want is an integral educa- 
tion of our various faculties; the culture of the whole 
human creature instead of a fraction of it, to take ths 
place of the present system, which develops the intellect 
to the total neglect of the emotional nature : like expand- 
ing the boiler, and leaving the furnace unenlarged. The 
whole scale of graduated animal life exemplifies com- 
mensurate development, and the whole scale of social life 
demands commensurate development. He owns to a cor- 
dial interest in art, and confesses that it was while con- 
templating the perplexed difficulties of English education 
generally that a discipline in the graphic art— a training 
of taste, eye, and hand in behoof of beauty and expres- 
sion — appeared to him with more and more certainty the 
missing educational element. 

While sympathizing in the views of this author as 
far as they go, a simple extension of the same thought 
enables us to see that not only do intellect and emotions 
exist, but that there can be no symmetrical development 
of the whole man which overlooks the wonderful phe- 
nomena of our physical nature. A thousand errors com- 
bine to make us wish that the science of human life was 
better understood and more generally made an indispen- 
sable part in the studies of our schools. I know it is often 
objected that too many things are taught, and that the 
tendency is to introduce still more. However true this 
remark may be with regard to astronomy, botany, spell- 



TRAINING THE PHYSICAL POWERS. 9 

ing and defining, or the ancient classics, certainly the 
study of our own physical organs should stand upon a 
different footing, since upon a knowledge of their opera- 
tion and capacity depend our health, strength, and the 
refinement of our intellectual and emotional faculties. 
As it is a branch of the same problem, I may be indulged, 
at the risk of a brief digression, with a suggestion in re- 
gard to the training of all the powers and functions of 
our physical organization. They constitute the forces of 
living beings and furnish the means of self-preservation. 
A man may not be able to tell whether Jupiter has four 
or six satellites, but his ignorance does not disturb their 
harmony ; he may be unacquainted with the marvelous 
processes of vegetable life, but that does not prevent the 
plants from maturing into the full perfection of their 
beauty; he may never have learned the difference be- 
tween an acid and an alkali, but chemical affinities will 
display their wonders in spite of all that. It is not so, 
however, with the structure of our bodies and the laws 
of physical life. There is a vast portion of human knowl- 
edge belonging to special pursuits, and whoever engages 
in any of these requires a training in the special science 
or art relating thereto. But a knowledge of the laws of 
physical development is equally essential to all men. Our 
external faculties are few, being computed at ^ye, yet in 
their endowment and operation they are so intermingled 
and combined as to impart to our outward movements and 
actions an almost infinite variety of use and expression. 
When properly trained and in their natural play, they 
work together like the parts of a well-regulated machine, 
and the sensory nature moves on to a still larger corre- 
spondence with whatever enlarges the mind and brightens 

the life of man. 
2 



CHAPTEK II. 

Industrial history in France — Her skilled labor and prosperity — Art-schools 
and the excellence of her fabrics — British trade — Its effect on Europe 
— Schools on the Continent — The Ecole municipal d'Apprentis in 
Paris — School at Besan9on — School of the Christian Brothers — The 
Ecole professionnelle of MM. Chaix et Cie. — School at Creuzot — Count 
Hasrach — Weaving-school at Mulhouse and Epinal — Industrial educa- 
tion at Limoges — The Ecole des Arts et Metiers — Government aid to 
art education in France — State aid discussed — Belgium, Germany, 
Bavaria, Wiirtemberg, Nuremberg — The French commission — Schoola 
in other countries of Europe. 

That education has to do with manual training, is a 
fact that has been recognized in the educational systems 
of nearly all civilized nations ; and the effect of it upon 
the useful arts and upon the greatness and happiness of 
a people has not been better illustrated in modern times 
than in the industrial history of France. JSTot many cent- 
uries have elapsed since only the great and rich were 
able to have domestics who were qualified to supply them 
with some articles of trade in common use. Occasionally 
an artificer working alone, without influence and without 
wealth, would furnish an article of beauty, or decorate a 
church or an altar-piece with consummate grace. But the 
industrial classes were for the most part in a debased con- 
dition. We know that this is changed, and that the most 



FRENCH INDUSTRIAL ART. H 

tliorough artisans in the world are found in France, and 
that the whole earth now pays tribute to her art and taste. 
She has been devastated by mighty wars ; her people have 
been sacrificed by millions; her expenditure has been 
almost beyond computation, and yet to-day she is, next 
to Great Britain, the richest of all nations, while perhaps 
her people are the happiest in Eujrope. "We can remem- 
ber her spoliation in the Franco-Prussian "War, and the 
heavy indemnity with which she was compelled to ran- 
som her peace ; and we can also remember how she arose 
as if by some supernatural influence from a prostration 
which would have indefinitely destroyed the industries 
of almost any other nation, and attained at a single step 
to the summit of prosperity. Just exactly how this was 
managed puzzled those who did not consider her cultivated 
arts. She had a monopoly in the markets of the world for 
many kinds of commodities which depend upon design 
and finish, and in which she had scarcely a competitor. 
Her skilled labor brought in its account against the world, 
and every civilized nation contributed to her prosperity. 
The foundations of her success were laid when art-schools 
were first established for the instruction of her children. 
Drawing and designing were taught to thousands of 
pupils, and their eyes and tastes were at the same time 
instructed by the beautiful statues and pictures of the 
masters. These schools have been multiplied until they 
exist in all the cities and manufacturing communities in 
France ; and the French workman has become the most 
accomplished artisan that the world has ever seen. An 
annual importation into this country alone of three or 
four hundred millions worth of the productions of French 
industrial art is evidence that it is not the pauper labor 



12 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

of Europe, but skilled labor of tlie highest order, that 
affects our own industries. 

The establishment of these schools by the French 
accounts largely for their superiority in architecture, en- 
graving, and pottery, as well as for the beauty and ele- 
gance of their silks, satins, muslins, and brocades ; and 
perhaps it is not too much to say that in all the arts ap- 
plied to industry the superior excellence of their fabrics 
is confessed by other manufacturing nations. It is not, 
therefore, surprising that France has given such a splen- 
did example of industrial or art education. 

This was undoubtedly to a considerable extent the 
work of necessity. Great Britain had spread her domin- 
ion until with the reveille of her drums, which followed 
the sun around the globe, her commerce and manufactures 
were carried even beyond her conquests or colonial pos- 
sessions. Nowhere had there ever been presented such a 
combination of facilities for industrial art. She possessed 
accumulated capital, and her crowded population fur- 
nished practiced and cheap labor. These with her abun- 
dance of coal, iron, ships, steam-engines, ingenious me- 
chanics, enterprising merchants, hardy sailors, and splen- 
did navigators to carry her products to the ends of the 
earth, had afforded grounds for the boast of her historian 
that she was the workshop of the world. The Continental 
nations viewed this prodigious increase of British manu- 
facture and trade with an eager solicitude ; and France, 
Germany, Switzerland, and others were roused to a deter- 
mination not to be satisfied without attaining a superiority 
in all the departments of useful art. Hence came schools 
of various names but with the same general purpose, 
adapted to local necessities and the industrial education 



fiCOLE MUNICIPAL D'APPRENTIS. 13 

of the people. First established on anything like a gen- 
eral footing in France, and afterward in Belgium, Ger- 
many, and Switzerland, they have been the means of con- 
tributing to the splendid industries pursued in the prin- 
cipal cities and towns of Europe. 

Here the workmen are trained intellectually in their 
special art, and the manufactory, the workshop, and the 
school-room are not unfrequently combined in the same 
system of education and reciprocal dependence. 

In the present condition of the useful arts it is neces- 
sary that workmen should understand the theory of their 
handicraft. The ideas which have prevailed in Europe 
have been develoj)ed for a number of years in an almost 
endless variety of schools; and although those schools 
embrace a very great diversity of organization, and are 
directed to educating workmen in every species of in- 
dustry above the rudest labor, yet they all agree in im- 
parting a mixed system of literary and technical instruc- 
tion. For example, take one of those recently estab- 
lished in Paris, the ilcole onunicipal cP Apprentis. It 
was founded at the expense of the city, and began its 
work in 1872. ISTo pupil is admitted before the age of 
thirteen. The course of instruction lasts three years, 
about half the time being given to schooling and the 
other half to practical work in one or other of the work- 
shops. Professor Thompson, after having visited this 
school seven times, writes that "the results attained by 
this school are truly striking." When we come, in a sub- 
sequent part of this work, to discuss the feasibility of 
combining industrial with public-school instruction, we 
will transcribe a more particular description of it, from a 
recent publication, as probably the finest example of an 



14 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

ideal industrial school. It is a striking evidence of the 
force and direction which industrial education has attained 
in France, and of how much is being done in that coun- 
try to invest mechanical labor with honorable distinction, 
by giving to the humblest children the means of practical 
education, so that by their intelligence and skill they can 
earn a livelihood and aspire to a condition far superior to 
their present one. 

The famous municipal school of theoretical and prac- 
tical watch-manufacture at Besangon is an instance of 
a technical school founded at the expense of the city 
which is the principal seat of the industry it is designed 
to promote. Besangon supplies four fifths of all the 
watches sold in France, and the school has for its object 
thoroughly to teach the children in the trade they intend 
to follow. They are taught not only to turn and temper 
metals and to make the several parts of a watch, but to 
manipulate atoms as small as the grain of sand that drops 
through the hour-glass ; and their technical education re- 
lates to everything having a bearing upon the work, such 
as arithmetic, mensuration, geography, mechanical draw- 
ing, geometry, and composition. When they have com- 
pleted the course of study, they know how to mark the 
divisions of time with ease and accuracy for horological 
purposes, and can graduate the dial of a common watch so 
that a second-hand in its circuit can be read at each fiftieth 
of the circle it describes, and the vibrations of a pendulum 
beating seconds through every hundredth division of its 
proper arc. Skilled labor in this ingenious art constitutes 
the wealth of that community ; and the public, appreciat- 
ing the general effect, are willing to incur the burden of 
its support for the general industrial and commercial ad- 



SCHOOLS OF THE CHRISTIAN BROTHERS. 15 

vantages conferred by a thorough and educated knowl- 
edge of watch-making. 

The schools of the Christian Brothers, located in the 
Kue de Yaugirard, Paris, may be considered a good ex- 
ample of a private institution for ordinary instruction 
and manual training combined. It has frequently been 
mentioned by writers with much commendation. The 
school-buildings form a quadrangle, and the inclosure 
serves as a play-ground. The students are as young as 
eight or nine years, but are not put to a trade until they 
attain thirteen. In the mean wliile they are instructed in 
the elementary branches, and, in addition thereto, in ar- 
chitectural and mechanical drawing in outline and shaded, 
with free-hand drawing and the rudiments of designing 
as applied to industrial objects. Those destined for an 
industrial career are, at the age of thirteen, put to learn 
trades in the workshops connected with the establish- 
ment. " Gilding, carving in wood or stone, trunk and 
portmanteau making, shoe-making, tailoring, weaving, 
book-binding, astronomical, mathematical, and musical 
instrument making, are among the trades taught there to 
one hundred and tliirty boys, who spend two hours in 
the workshop and the remainder at their books." The 
boys pay about one franc a day for board, lodging, and 
instruction, and those who are unable to pay the whole 
amount are assisted out of a fund created for that purpose 
from the donations of the charitable and the well-wishers 
of the institution. 

The course comprises three years, and the schooling is 
not only as good as in other schools, but at the end they 
are well qualified for some useful occupation. The pupils 
work from drawings, which are mostly prepared by them- 



16 EDUCATION m ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

selves ; for all learn drawing and modeling, and all indus- 
trial instruction is given by practical workmen in charge 
of the shops. Lessons and manual occupations alternate 
morning and afternoon. During the third year each pu- 
pil settles down to the particular pursuit he most fancies 
or which is best adapted to his talents. In sjDeaking of 
the result the director observes : "Our apprentices, being 
at once fit for useful work on entering the employment, 
are less often employed to run errands, they are better 
treated, and steadier. I could tell you of young lads of 
fifteen who are actually earning two francs and a half and 
two francs and seventy-five centimes a day, and who in 
six months more will be paid as regular workmen." 

One of the British artisans described his visit to this 
school as a " grand treat." 

Another peculiar development is the interest mani- 
fested by large business companies in the subject of 
industrial education. Some of the finest schools are 
attached to these establishments. Such is the Ecole Pro- 
fessionnelle in the printing-house of Messieurs Chaix et 
Compagnie, in Paris. Two hours a day are allotted to les- 
sons in the school-room, which is contiguous to the work- 
shop. The teaching comprises a special primary course for 
those whose schooling has been insufficient ; a technical 
course, including grammar and composition, reading of 
proofs, the study of types, engraving, and the reading and 
composing of English, German, Latin, and Greek, as far as 
to qualify for type-setting, and a variety of other studies 
chiefly having a bearing upon the business of printing. 
The course lasts four years, and the apprentices receive 
wages according to the work performed. At the end of 
the apprenticeship the pupils elect, almost without excep- 



M. CHAIX'S SCHOOL FOR APPRENTICES. 17 

tion, to become employes of the firm, and enter at once 
into the rank of participants in the yearly division of 
the profits. Says the writer from whom these facts are 
taken : " The financial results of these arrangements, at 
once educational and prudential in their nature, are most 
encouraging. M. Berger, the accomplished inspector of 
this department of the enterprise, attributes the substan- 
tial growth and prosperity of the business, now one of the 
largest and wealthiest in France, as much to that influ- 
ence as to any other. He prides himself upon the superior 
intelligence of his pupils and their technical knowledge, 
gained while they are in the very midst of a great busi- 
ness, and thus forced to keep au courant with commercial 
exigencies. The few who have gone out to take places 
elsewhere are also doing well." 

Aside from the technical and professional training 
afforded by the schools, there are certain marked features 
in the establishment which give it the air of a brother- 
hood. The employes and apprentices are organized into 
several institutions, forming a system of mutual benefit to 
promote the interest and welfare of all. Some of these 
funds are contributed by members themselves, others by 
assessments upon the profits of the business, and still 
others by the voluntary gifts made each year by M. 
Chaix for the benefit of the apprentices. There are also 
savings-funds and accidental and life insurance funds for 
the benefit of the workmen. Messieurs Chaix et Com- 
pagnie cherish feelings of active personal interest in their 
employes, and cultivate a fraternal relation with them in 
all their intercourse and dealings. And the great suc- 
cess which has marked their business career points in more 
ways than one to the legitimate connection between capi- 



18 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

tal and labor, and shows what may be accomplished by 
kindly offices and mutual benefactions. 

There is another eminent example of a school found- 
ed by a business company for the technical instruction 
of their workmen, at Creuzot, where the most impor- 
tant iron-works in France are located. Previous to the 
year 1836 it was a miserable, poverty-stricken village of 
about 2,700 inhabitants, and so hopeless was the business 
that for several years it had been almost abandoned. At 
that time the place became the property of Messieurs 
Schneider, to whom the worjvS still belong, with some 
other partners of limited liability. In 1867 the place 
was visited by Mr. Bernhard Samuelson, of England, 
then a member of Parliament, and his description of it 
has been transcribed by Mr. Stetson in his book on tech- 
nical education. It exhibits the very wonderful results 
which have been achieved by organization and the schools 
established by the company for the instruction of their 
workmen. The course consists of a number of elementary 
studies, with others, such as natural philosophy, the chem- 
istry of metals, mechanical and free-hand drawing, and 
modeling. The most promising boys are sent to the 
higher technical schools, and they return to fill the re- 
sponsible positions in the management of the extensive 
business. The other boys are drafted from the school 
into the works, and are placed there strictly according to 
the capacity which they have shown at school, some as 
simple workmen, others as accountants and draughtsmen. 
Of late years the pupils from the 'Ecole des Arts et 
Metiers have been appointed to teach special classes in 
matters bearing directly upon the occupation of the work- 
men, and including, as one of the most important, a com- 



SPECIAL SCHOOLS AT CREUZOT AND NEUWELT. 19 

plete course of macliine-drawing ; and there is not a man 
among the mechanics employed in the construction of 
engines who could not make an accurate drawing of the 
work on which he is engaged. Under these influences 
the little village has become a well-built and well-paved 
town, with its churches, its schools, its markets, its gas and 
water works, and twenty-four thousand well-fed, well-edu- 
cated, and decently-clad people. And in this connection I 
can not omit mentioning, although they are not in France, 
the celebrated workshops of Count Hasrach, upon his es- 
tates at ISTeuwelt, in Austro-IIungary, for the manufacture 
of artistic glassware. Every workman in his factories has 
received a special training for his occupation, and has 
even enjoyed a preliminary course of travel over the 
Continent, to visit other works of the same kind, so as 
to expand and instruct his mind before commencing the 
practical business of life. These causes have resulted in 
the highest state of perfection to which the processes of 
enameling, painting, embossing, and engraving on glass 
have been brought. The works were properly repre- 
sented at the International Exhibition in the city of Mel- 
bourne, where it is reported that the exhibit included the 
rich ruby and the delicate amber glass, the malachite, 
the frosted, and the granulated gold or rainbow glass, 
as also that which is crackled by plunging the vessel, 
when it has reached a certain temperature, into ice-cold 
water and then replacing it in the furnace ; the alter- 
nate expansion and contraction to which it is thus ex- 
posed giving it the appearance from which it derives 
its name. Drinking-cups of green enameled glass, of 
medisBval designs ; vases decorated with pictures of ex- 
quisite finish, worthy of the pencil of Watteau ; others 



20 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

covered with a white enamel, and others still ornamented 
in sunk silver, were all conspicuous for their beauty and 
splendid finish. Here is another example of an individ- 
ual actuated by the laudable ambition of providing re- 
munerative and skilled employment for the people on his 
estates, and to perfect and improve a beautiful branch of 
art industry, and who has devoted himself to both objects 
with the grandest results. 

The Power-Loom Weaving School, at Mulhouse, dif- 
fers from any of those already mentioned in this, that it 
was founded by those engaged in a particular branch of 
industry, by the manufacturers as a class of that place, in 
order to provide intelligent workmen, and to promote 
the peculiar industry of Mulhouse, and to enable those 
engaged in it to produce better textile fabrics than could 
possibly be done by ignorant workmen. The beneficial 
results were acknowledged far beyond the limits of that 
town, for they have been of immense value to that in- 
dustr}^ throughout the whole province of Alsace. The 
school was suspended by the Franco-German "War. The 
Industrial School at Epinal was founded in 1871, to sup- 
ply the place of the one at Mulhouse, with a similar system 
of instruction, except that perhaps it is of a still higher 
grade. The students' work will compare favorably with 
that performed in the great schools of arts and trades. 
Mulhouse is famous for its fine muslins and cotton prints, 
of which a greater quantity is made here than in any 
other place. Its manufacturers excel in the processes 
of dyeing cloth. The best means of extracting the or- 
ganic colors for the practical use of the printer have been 
discovered by the accurate investigation of each distinct 
coloring-matter separately. This indispensable knowl- 



STATE SCHOOL AT LIMOGES. 21 

edge has been furnished bj the practical cliemists who 
are constantly employed by the manufacturers ; and the 
most effective manner of applying them to textile fabrics 
in the form of attractive patterns is by the rules incul- 
cated in the school of design which still belongs to the 
" Society of Industry." 

The Government of France recognizes the vast im- 
portance of extending its assistance to schools for the 
technical instruction of her youth. A conspicuous evi- 
dence of this has recently been given by a decree relating 
to the technical school at Limoges, by which it became 
a state institution. In ancient times Limoges was re- 
nowned for its works in enamel, of which many choice 
examples are still found in the ceramic collections of 
Europe ; and it is a recommendation of a modern design 
to say that it is after the style of the old Limoges enamel. 
The town suffered greatly from the decay of this indus- 
try, for it almost completely run out. In 1766 kaolin 
was discovered near Limoges in great abundance and of 
excellent quality. Porcelain-works were established, and 
the place is now the center of that industry in France. 
In 1862 the school, which has just been adopted by the 
Government, was founded by Adrien Dubouche. Con- 
vinced of the vital importance for a special training of 
the young who were to work at the trades of the place, 
he established the school out of his own means and by 
the aid of the municipality, from whom he obtained a 
small subvention. He also established free town schools 
to teach the fine arts, as applied to the industrial arts, and 
gave them his personal attention and supervision. Ow- 
ing to these causes, Limoges has again become a great 
seat of art-industry. Immense establishments in porce- 



22 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

lain manufacture liave grown up, and poverty and drunk- 
enness have disappeared. This town was the birthplace 
of many great men, of whom the chief are Pope Clem- 
ent YI, the Chancellor d'Agnesseau, Yergniaud, Marshal 
Jourdan, and others ; but none of them all deserves a 
monument to his memory more than the industrial phi- 
lanthropist Adrien Dubouche. 

By the governmental decree, it is reorganized under 
the title of Ecole Rationale d'Art Decoratif a Limoges, 
for the purpose of training boys and girls — ^for it is open 
to both alike — as teachers of drawing, and for the exercise 
of trades connected with art. It provides instruction 
specially appropriate to the trades chosen by the pupils. 
Besides several general studies, there are also special 
courses for different applications of drawing for trade 
purposes, pottery, enameling, and engraving. Provision 
is made for prizes, scholarships, and examinations. The 
boys, on entering, must be over thirteen years of age, 
and the girls over twelve. Tuition is free. 

Among the examples which the French Government 
has given of its interest in the technical education of the 
people, the Ecole des Arts et Metiers is perhaps the 
most remarkable. I transcribe a small portion of the re- 
port made concerning these celebrated schools by Joshua 
L. Chamberlain, one of the commission from the United 
States to the Paris Exposition of 1878, upon the subject 
of education. I select the following only : 

It was the Convention in 1784 which decreed that 
there should be formed in Paris, under the name of the 
Conservatory of Arts and Trades, a public depot of ma- 
chines, models, tools, drawings, descriptions, and books 
upon all arts and trades, the construction and employment 



ECOLE DES ARTS ET METIERS. 23 

of which should be explained by three demonstrators and 
a draughtsman attached to the establishment. The end 
proposed by the founders was the practical instruction of 
workmen. Their motto was, " They must be made to see 
rather than to speak." Four years later an ancient priory 
was opened for this great work. Such was the beginning 
of an institution which has engaged the interest of some 
of the greatest men of France, and which has rendered 
so great service to industry in illustrating and explaining 
the applications of science to the arts. It has to-day a 
costly library of 24,000 volumes relating to science, art, 
and industry, installed in the ancient refectory, now splen- 
didly restored, and which disputes with Sainte-Chapelle 
the distinction of being the most elegant and graceful 
monument of Gothic architecture which exists in France. 
The Conservatoire has a collection of objects appropriate 
to its design, the mere titles of which fill a volume of 
four hundred closely-printed pages. At present there are 
fourteen chairs of instruction. It may be well to give 
their designations, and the names of the professors occu- 
pying them : 

Geometry applied to the Arts. — Colonel Laussedat. 

Descriptive Geometry. — De la Gournerie. 

Mechanics applied to the Arts. — Tresca. 

Oiml Construction. — Trelat. 

Physics applied to the Arts. — Becquerel. 

General Chemistry in its Relation to Industry. — 
Peligot. 

Industrial Chemistry. — Gerard . 

Chemistry applied to the Industries of Dyeing^ Ce- 
ramics^ and Glass-worMng. — De Luynes. 

Agricultural and Analytical Chemistry. — Bousin- 
gault and Schloessing. 

Architecture. — Moll. 

Agricultural WorTcs and Rural Engineering. — Man- 

Spinning and Weaving. — Alcan. 
Political Economy and Statistics. — Burat. 



24 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

The course of instruction is not unlike that at the 
Sorbonne, the College of France, and the Museum of Nat- 
ural History. The lectures are public and free to all, for- 
eigners and citizens alike. It is a deeply interesting scene 
for an American to sit amid that motley auditory, some- 
times numbering nearly a thousand, all listening intently 
to the masterly yet simple expositions of men like Bec- 
querel, Burat, Gerard, and Levasseur, of all conditions 
and ages, from the boy of twelve, first waking to the 
thought of the possibilities in the great world before 
him, to the dim-eyed sire of eighty years, now at last 
realizing what might have been. There are as many as 
160,000 of these auditors each year. 

The schools of arts and trades are designed to train 
superintendents and foremen of workshops and well-in- 
structed and skillful artisans in the working of iron and 
wood. There are three of these in France — at Chalon- 
sur-Marne, at Angers, and at Aix. There are at each of 
these three hundred pupils, admitted upon competitive 
examinations. They are between the ages of fifteen and 
seventeen years. These pupils live in the school-build- 
ing. 

The course of study extends through three years. 
The theoretical teaching comprises arithmetic, geometry, 
elementary algebra, rectilinear trigonometry, descriptive 
geometry, mechanics, physics and chemistry, drawing, 
geography, grammar, and accounts. Seven hours of labor 
a day are devoted to practical instruction given in four 
workshops — carpentry and modeling, foundry, forging, 
and adjusting. Diplomas and silver medals certify to the 
aptitudes of the pupils, and serve as recompense at the end 
of the course. 

The exhibits of these three schools attracted con- 
siderable interest. Steam-engines of various sorts, ma- 
chines for use in wood and iron work, showed the 
theoretical and practical mastery attained by the pupils. 
The drawings and other exercises were also highly cred- 
itable. 



GOVERNMENT AID IN FRANCE. 25 

From this brief sketch we may learn the immense 
weight which the French Government and people attach 
to the subject of industrial education, and the thorough 
and splendid manner in which they treat it. 

It is noticeable that Government aid to art education 
is never contested in France, and it has always played a 
considerable part in the technical instruction of the work- 
ing-people. The question is regarded as one of public 
interest, and the current administration might as well 
abdicate its power as to ignore its responsibihty for the 
support of art-schools. Governments have succeeded 
each other pretty often in France, but these ideas and 
purposes have survived their successive falls; and each 
in its turn has recognized the improvement of the people 
in the useful arts as among the highest obligations of 
executive authority. The need and security of public 
assistance is so well fixed in the customs of the people, 
and is so completely identified with the tendencies and 
expectations of the country, that every Minister of Public 
Instruction, from M. Cousin to M. Jules Ferry, has used 
the most liberal exercise of his office in its behalf. Like 
the elementary schools, they are placed under his author- 
ity. The instruction is free to all, the law is equal to all, 
and there is an opportunity for any boy in France, how- 
ever poor his circumstances, to obtain an art-education 
which shall cost him nothing. The Minister of Public 
Instruction is of high official importance ; he is a member 
of the Cabinet ; his estimates are placed in the budget, 
and, notwithstanding the magnitude of the other depart- 
ments of the Government, he is recognized as represent- 
ing the most important interests in the republic. 

" In every town of any importance in a manufacturing 



26 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

point of view, in every district of all the principal cities, 
there is to be found the art-school, just as there is to be 
found the church or the baker's shop." The examples 
already given are only typical ones, of which there are 
hundreds besides. All the elements of society conceive 
themselves equally interested in this preparation of the 
rising generatiojis. ]^eed we be astonished at the perfec- 
tion of art-industry in France ? The explanation is easy 
when we consider the causes of these wonderful phenom- 
ena. 

With us, the idea that the state should share with 
society in the public instruction of the useful arts looks 
like an interference with private right. Perhaps the 
limit of legislative action is not easily determined. But 
surely, when the object is not in the interest of a favored 
class, but to raise up and elevate all the industrious 
classes together for the benefit of the whole body, it 
ought not to be regarded by any sincere friend of the 
race as an infringement upon the guarantees of equal 
laws. Whether this is so, will be discussed when in the 
course of this work the subject of manual training in the 
public schools shall be reached. Meanwhile, we may 
learn much from France, for the people there would hold 
the Government extremely culpable that would neglect 
a duty so sacred. 

In Germany something of the same kind had been 
attempted, perhaps at an earlier date than in any other 
quarter of Europe ; and it is highly probable that the 
schools there for training workmen are among the most 
remarkable in Europe. Schools of design, and polytech- 
nic and industrial schools, are as numerous as any other 
kind of schools. But the best German exhibits of art- 



INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS IN GERMANY. 27 

schools in the Paris and Vienna Expositions of 1867 and 
1873 were those from Bavaria and Wiirtemberg. 

It is most nnaccountable that there were no educa- 
tional exhibits from Germany at the Expositions of 1876 
and 1878. This is the more to be regretted, since it is 
supposed that she leads the world in matters of education. 

The schools at ^Nuremberg are characterized by dis- 
tinct and peculiar merits which deserve to be noticed, in- 
formation of which comes from another source, that of 
the sub-committee of the French Commission appointed 
to inquire into the state of technical instruction in Ger- 
many and Switzerland, who say in their general report : 
" In this town (J^uremberg), so noted for its various man- 
ufactures, there are several drawing-schools of different 
degrees, according to the trade the pupils intend to fol- 
low. The first and most important is the higher school 
of industrial drawing, conducted by M. Kroling. It is 
justly regarded in Germany as the one which has ren- 
dered most service to industry"; and after stating the 
method of teaching, the report adds, " The general opin- 
ion of the persons who have made a study of questions 
connected with teaching, not only in Bavaria, but also in 
other parts of Germany, is, that the JSTuremberg school 
has contributed more than any other to the progress of 
the national industry." 

I transcribe a single sentence from the special report 
on "Wiirtemberg : " There have been established, in the 
kingdom of Wiirtemberg, more than four hundred draw- 
ing-schools ; and this organization, which does not date 
back more than ten years, has already led to very decided 
improvements in the manufactures of the country. It is 
satisfactory to know that the designers trained in these 



28 EDUCATION m ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY, 

schools, if they evince any considerable degree of taste 
and invention, easily find occupation in their own coun- 
try. The more distinguished of them are sometimes sent 
to France for improvement. . . . They" (the schools) 
" were founded after the Universal Exhibition of 1851, to 
enable the manufacturers of the country to compete with 
France in the industrial arts." 

Industrial schools in Austria and Hungary have kept 
pace with those of other countries. They are very nu- 
merous in Switzerland, and have been introduced in Italy, 
Sweden, Denmark, the Netherlands, and even Spain, as 
a systematic part of public instruction. 

We conclude this chapter by saying that we shall 
return to the subject of industrial education in Europe 
in one or two of the chapters following. 



CHAPTEE III. 

Industrial Education in Russia — The Practical Technological Institute at 
St. Petersburg — The Imperial Technical School at Moscow — ^Exhibits 
of, at the Exposition of 18'76 and 1878 — Moscow fitly chosen — Two 
other schools for teaching trades to boys — Movement in England — 
Continental artisans — British artisans at Paris Exposition, 1867 — 
Schools of art-instruction — South Kensington Museum — "Walter Smith 
— French and English methods compared — Spread of art-schools in 
the United Kingdom — Their effect upon industries requiring art — 
Comparison of art-products — The leading nation in the industries 
depending upon art — Advantages stated — The favorable effect upon 
the artisan — Favorable to morality — The problem abroad, 

I DO not pretend to any special knowledge upon the 
subject of industrial education in Russia, aside from what 
may be learned by any one who will take the trouble to 
read the general report of Governor John W. Hoyt, one 
of the commissioners of the United States to the Centen- 
nial Exhibition of 1876 (Yol. YIII, page 165). The 
Russian educational exhibit is referred to in that report 
with a fullness of description quite justified by the very 
interesting character of the movement in that empire for 
technical and practical education combined. The Russian 
publications and circulars elucidative of the system are 
set forth, and certainly constitute a chapter in the history 
of practical instruction which must have a marked effect, 
not only upon Russia, but in every other country where 



30 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

professional and teclinical schools exist. Indeed, the 
commissioner closes one part of his report with the re- 
mark that " what Kussia has done for technical educa- 
tion at the Philadelphia Exhibition no man may now 
estimate. It is certain that the service was very great, 
and has earned for her the gratitude of all who are at 
work upon its problems, whether in the Old or New 
World." 

Much useful information is furnished in the report in 
regard to the Strongonoff Central School of Practical 
Drawing, and the Pedagogic Museum at St. Petersburg, 
both of which are important auxiliaries in the develop- 
ment of industrial studies. The institutions, however, 
that come nearest to the subject of this work are the 
Practical Technological Institute at St. Petersburg and 
the Imperial Technical School at Moscow. It is only 
after having observed and studied their exhibit with great 
and scrupulous care that the commissioner analyzes and 
comments upon them as perhaps the most admirable 
agencies yet employed upon the problem of industrial 
education. Owing to the backward condition of Pussia, 
it is difficult to obtain reliable statistics, and it is most 
fortunate that such a competent and disinterested ob- 
server as Governor Hoyt had an opportunity to see and 
hear for himself to the minutest and most complete de- 
tail. But our space limits us to a statement of some 
of the principal facts only, and the impressions which 
they suggest. The two technical schools are founded 
nearly upon the same principles. Before entering the 
institute at St. Petersburg, the candidate must have 
graduated from one of the middle schools, and must 
pass a competitive examination. There are two depart- 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN RUSSIA. 31 

ments, mechanical and cliemical. In the mechanical 
department the course includes a variety of studies having 
relation to applied mechanics, the art of construction, and 
mechanical drawing, and a part of the time is employed 
by the students at manual labor in various workshops and 
mills belonging to the institute. 

The system is as follows : " The practical studies are 
divided into three courses. In the first course the student 
works with a chisel and file upon cast iron, performing 
six consecutive studies ; in the second course the students 
begin upon wrought iron, fulfilling nineteen consecutive 
tasks ; thereafter they are removed to the fitting-shops, 
where they are obliged to perform fifteen tasks, occupy- 
ing themselves with turning, cutting screw-threads, and 
soldering. The last course is in the construction and 
joining of difierent engines." During the five years of 
the course of study, six hundred and forty-eight hours 
are devoted to manual labor in the workshops. Of these 
there are four : " The filer's shop with sixty places, each 
fitted with a vise and the necessary tools for the filer's 
course ; the forging-shop, with ten places ; the turning- 
shop, with sixteen places ; and the construction-shop. In 
the first three the students work in alternating sections 
until they have completed the obligatory courses." 

In these shops the students, under the management 
of experienced masters, begin to exercise in the most 
simple works, gradually passing to more complicated, and 
at last finishing with constructions and joinery of all the 
parts of an engine. Finally, they graduate either as en- 
gineers for workshops or for railroads, and their prac- 
tical teaching has made them skilled workmen in the use 
of a great variety of tools. 



32 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

In some of its leading features the Imperial Technical 
School at Moscow is not unlike the Free Institute in this 
country at Worcester, and the Manual Training School 
of the Washington University at St. Louis. It has, for 
instance, a special division divided into three branches : 
mechanical construction, mechanical engineering, and 
technological engineering ; and, in connection with these, 
all the sciences are taught which are considered funda- 
mental or collateral to any given branch in the course, 
and the students of all the classes are occupied during a 
stated period of time in practical work in the laboratories 
and mechanical workshops. These shops are under the 
management of a technologist or skilled workman, whose 
duty it is to instruct the pupils in the rudiments of me- 
chanical labor, so that in the first place they become 
acquainted with all the work of mechanical art, namely, 
turning, fitting, carpentering, and forging, in the school 
workshops, and they are then deemed qualified to be ad- 
mitted to what are called the mechanical works. These 
latter are distinct from the school workshops, for they are 
placed upon a commercial footing with hired workmen, 
accepting and carrying out orders from private individ- 
uals for the construction of steam-engines, working-en- 
gines, pumps, motors, agricultural machines, etc. It will 
be seen, therefore, that while the school workshops are 
designed to impart manual knowledge and dexterity, the 
mechanical works are for the education of young men in 
the branches of mechanical engineering and mechanical 
construction of the highest order. The object of sepa- 
rating the school workshop from the mechanical works 
was to secure the systematic teaching of elementary prac- 
tical work, and to admit the pupils only to the latter when 



INDUSTRIAL EDFCATION IN RUSSIA. 33 

they have perfectly acquired tlie principles and habits of 
practical labor. In the workshops the pupils learnt the 
use of tools which the common and otherwise uneducated 
class of work-people may be expected to possess, but a 
practical knowledge of which is quite indispensable at 
this moment to the educated technologist. Acting, there- 
fore, upon the principle that mechanical engineers and con- 
structors should have a practical experience in the me- 
chanical arts, the Imperial Technical School has employed 
the separation of work and the graduation of studies in 
such manner as will best secure a solution of the difficulty 
in the best possible manner and in the shortest space of 
time. The director, from whose circular these facts are 
gathered, concludes his elaborate statement by observing 
that " eight years have already elapsed (1876) since the 
programmes of instruction in the mechanic arts were in- 
troduced into the workshops of the school, and they have 
been found to attain in the most brilliant manner the aim 
proposed in their introduction." 

In order to show the methods employed in the school 
at Moscow, as well as the completeness of its exhibit at 
the Centennial, the commissioner has added a synoptical 
statement of its samples and tools, which alone occupy 
nearly six closely-printed pages of the report. 

In the year 1870, at the exhibition of manufactures at 
St. Petersburg, this school first exhibited its methods of 
teaching mechanical arts ; and from that time they have 
been introduced into all the technical schools- of Kussia, 
which are on the increase and now exist in nearly all the 
principal centers and cities of the empire, affording edu- 
cational facilities in matters of useful art on quite an ex- 
tensive scale. 



34: EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

In a country like Russia, which is so far behind every 
other European nation in education and civilization, and 
where it is estimated that not over eight per cent, of the 
men and three per cent, of the women have ever had any 
schooling, these institutions at the two capitals must exert 
a most beneficial and wide-spread influence. They and 
kindred schools are sending forth every year hundreds of 
men educated, enlightened, and skilled in the civilizing 
arts of life, and will carry with them the elements of 
civilization in their highest perfection wherever they go 
in that vast empire. 

There is a peculiar fitness in the establishment of this 
noble institution in the ancient capital of Kussia. Mos- 
cow still attracts our sympathies. By historical necessity 
it was the capital, and by religious tradition the holy city 
of the empire. For centuries it was the theatre of all the 
calamities resulting from wars, sieges, fire, and pestilence. 
The Muscovite princes founded Russia from the mass of 
barbarous tribes, and created the splendid reign of the 
Czars. It published the first code of Russian laws, and 
introduced the first attempts at civilization among the un- 
cultivated multitude of its wandering tribes. And, more 
lately, in order to preserve the security and independence 
of the country from the footstep of the invader, who was 
already reposing within the sacred walls of the Kremlin, 
it delivered its towers, its palaces, its cathedrals, and its 
dwellings to the flames of a conflagration which destroyed 
them all ; and thus associated the terrible event in the 
heart of Europe as the most devoted and costly tribute 
that had ever been placed on the shrine of patriot- 
ism. But by the foundation of the Imperial Technical 
School she promises a greater service than she has ever 



IN RUSSIA AND ENGLAND. 35 

rendered for tlie cultivation and refinement of the 
people. 

Again, at tlie Exposition of 1878, the Russian exhibit 
of industrial school work was admitted to excel all others. 
Four of such schools were represented, two of them being 
of a grade inferior to those already described, viz : the 
Alexander Technical School, situated at Tcherepovetz ; 
and the School of Trades of the Czarowitz JSTicholas, at St. 
Petersburg. In both the pupils receive a general educa- 
tion, and the boys are admitted at the age of thirteen and 
fourteen. Simultaneously with their general studies they 
are taught the use of tools in several trades, and, after 
having acquired the requisite proficiency in handling 
them, they make choice of a trade, to which their work- 
shop practice is afterward confined. 

England did not regard with indifference the effect 
produced upon the manufacturing arts by these new edu- 
cational forces. She plainly foresaw her inability to 
maintain her superiority in the markets of the world, un- 
less she also took steps properly to instruct those who were 
to carry on the great industries upon which her welfare 
depended. The education of her workmen attracted the 
attention of her thoughtful and influential classes, and 
technical schools were established soon after the Exposi- 
tion of 1851. It was there made evident that her manu- 
factured articles, although in strength and solid work- 
manship quite equal to any others on exhibition, were yet 
much inferior in appearance and ornamental design when 
contrasted with the finished products of French and Ger- 
man art. The Continental artisan is trained in the prin- 
ciple of his trade. He is generally able to prepare his 
own drawings and make his own models ; or, if not suf- 



36 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

cientlj skilled or ingenious to invent a beautiful design, 
or to give a new shape or configuration to a manufact- 
ured article, he can at least decipher it with a relish of 
its appearance. He therefore works with pleasure, and 
views the product of his labor as the offspring of his 
skill, and perhaps of his genius. His industry is in- 
spired by his enthusiasm. From the mold of a button 
to the perfection of a bronze, all is a work of art. 

The English Council of Arts and Science sent eighty 
skilled workmen, representing almost' every industry, to 
the Paris Exposition of 1867, and to visit various work- 
shops and manufactories in France. Each workman, upon 
his return, was required to furnish, and did furnish, a writ- 
ten report, giving the result of his observations. A con- 
densed statement of these reports is given by C. B. Stet- 
son, in his admirable book on " Technical Education," 
and he justly declares that they " form one of the most 
valuable contributions to the industrial literature of the 
day." The. impression was not favorable to English art, 
but it gave a prodigious impulse to industrial education, 
and schools devoted to art-instruction became very nu- 
merous. Those at Nottingham, Birkenhead, Coventry, 
the "Wedgwood Memorial, and the Burslem School of 
Art, rank perhaps as among the most important. But 
the first place must be assigned to the South Kensington 
Museum, London, and the schools attached to it. Here 
are taught children from under ten years of age in free- 
hand drawing, up to the highest professional instruction 
in every branch of art. In the work on " Art Education," 
by "Walter Smith, we find a brief account of this institu- 
tion, from which it appears that it is the national train- 
ing-school, from which most of the teachers in the local 



SOUTH KENSINGTON MUSEUM, LONDON. 37 

schools of art come. It is the opinion of Mr. Smith that 
there is no fundamental difference between the English 
and German systems, except that the latter is the most 
scientific of the two. The same stages of study are com- 
mon to the national training-school and to those through- 
out England, and from this circumstance there is a 
general similiarity in the works of all the schools, and 
harmony in the national system. This systematizing of 
art-study is made more certain by the annual examina- 
tions of the schools in every grade of study, with the 
same tests for each grade in every school throughout the 
country. The building up of this system has taken many 
years to accomplish. The distinctive features of the 
scheme date from the year 1851, and the details have 
been wrought out and consolidated by successful experi- 
ment since that time. The administration is in a depart- 
ment of the Government, and thus uniformity of plan is 
secured. 

The author then explains the agencies employed for 
industrial art education : 1. A museum of industrial 
masterpieces, and a large portion of the national collec- 
tion of pictures. 2. A national training-school for art- 
masters. 3. A traveling museum for exhibition, which 
circulates good specimens of industrial art in the prov- 
inces, and forms the nucleus for local exhibitions ; and 
also the circulation of books and paintings, on loan, to 
provincial schools. 4. Examination and supervision of 
all grades of art-instruction carried on in connection with 
the national system. Art-instruction is divided into three 
grades, progressing in difficulty, and called first, sec- 
ond, and third grade. The first grade of instruction is 
given in day-schools to children by teachers holding the 



38 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

second-grade certificate. Examinations in this grade are 
conducted in three subjects — free-hand, model, and geo- 
metrical drawing. The second grade comprises the ele- 
mentary instruction in schools of art and night drawing- 
classes, and is the grade in which teachers of the national 
or common schools become certificated. The subjects 
are free-hand, model, geometric, and perspective drawing, 
all in outline; to which is added, for teachers, black- 
board drawing from memory. The third grade consists 
of the highest subjects of instruction in drawing from 
copies, casts, nature, and original design ; painting, mod- 
ehng, architecture, drawing and design, and mechanical 
and machine drawing from copies and models, which 
form the studies in schools of art ; and the masters or 
mistresses of such schools have to become certificated in 
this grade before the Government recognizes them as 
art masters or mistresses. The drawings are sent to 
London for examination, exhibition, and rewards. The 
studies are twenty-three in number ; and the certificates 
are awarded after an examination at the close of the win- 
ter session. 

After noticing the effects of this system, Mr. Smith 
reasons that, as a scheme of art-education, comprehending 
all the necessities, whether of the child, the artisan, or 
the art-student, the English must be acknowledged to be 
more thoroughly adapted to the general wants of all 
grades of society than any other ; because it has more 
scope, is progressive in its grades of instruction, and pro- 
vides, what no other national system does so thoroughly, 
for the professional education and examination, of the art- 
masters who are to carry it out ; and he concludes by ob- 
serving : " I have spoken more fully on the scheme of 



WALTER SMITH'S VIEWS. 39 

art-education originating in England than I should have 
done otherwise, because its recent success, both in com- 
mon-school instruction and influence upon manufacturing 
industry, has drawn the attention of the whole w^orld to 
its organization and system ; and also because I have no- 
ticed that theorists, who know little or nothing of either 
plan (English or French) practically, are in the habit of 
comparing French and English methods, to the great dis- 
advantage of the latter. Now, I entirely disagree with 
that view, and hope that I can judge impartially of the 
two, not blinded by national prejudice, but as a prac- 
tical educator, having already written, perhaps, more in 
favor of French art-education than any other English- 
man ; and I contend that, in this subject, as in all others, 
before any person is competent to discriminate the good 
points of both systems he must be familiar with both, in 
the class-room and lecture-room — not for a day or year, 
but for many years — and see the effects upon many stu- 
dents through a whole course of study. This has been my 
experience. When I say also that a better scheme than 
either can, I believe, be developed in this country, it will 
be seen that, while I have more faith in the English than 
the French system, I hope that the American will be the 
best of all. Still, it must be remembered that we are, in 
this country, only buckling on our armor, and must not 
boast as those who are taking it off." 

The progress of these schools, in elevating the taste in 
art-industry and enhancing the standard of industrial 
products, has been more marked on the British Isles than 
in any other state of Europe. The technical or science 
schools and the schools of art in the United Kingdom ex- 
ceed in number those of any other country. Some of 



40 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. \ 

them are private institutions, some are endowed and en- 
tirely free, and many of them receive assistance from the 

Government or from the community in their neighbor- ! 

hood. They each have from four to six classes in indus- i 

trial art, and many of these are night-classes, to accom- I 

modate those who cannot attend during the day. The : 
teachers come mostly from the National Training School 

at South Kensington. The number of schools may be ; 

estimated at several thousand, representing every branch '■ 

of industry, art, and applied science. | 

The magnificent work accomplished by these institu- 
tions has been most beneficial upon the great interests of I 
the British Empire, since to this cause may be ascribed I 
her rapid progress in the art of improvement of domestic ; 
manufactures, by which she furnishes not only the cheap- I 
est and best goods, but those which are attractive and ! 
salable by their style and appearance, thus maintaining ! 
her enormous commercial industry without a parallel 
among foreign nations. Mr. Nichols exhibits the statis- I 
tics showing the increase of art-productions in Britain ' 
over those in France of late years before he published his 
book. From 1847 to 1856 it appears that thirty-five per ' 
cent, of the French exportations were of art-industry, and | 
from 1856 to 1868 they scarcely amounted to sixteen per 
cent., a decrease in twelve years of more than one-half. '■ 
Now, during the first period France was nearly ten per | 
cent, ahead of Great Britain, but during the second period, i 
that is, from 1856 to 1868, the export of British products ' 
in which art was required exceeded in value those of I 
France 505,000,000 francs, and with a greatly increased ' 
value in her total exportations her art-products were 
twelve per cent, more than those of France. In other i 



PROGRESS OF ART-INDUSTRY IN ENGLAND. 41 

words, while this kind of industry had increased in Great 
Britain 442,000,000 francs, it had decreased 68,000,000 
francs in France. These figures exemplify in a striking 
manner how great had been the change and how im- 
mense the progress of the British Renaissance since the 
introduction of art-instruction for her industries. The 
author observes ; " Until within a few years, the supe- 
riority of France in its art-productions was not doubted 
or contested. With those articles of industry into which 
art entered she filled the markets of the world. With a 
self-confidence peculiar to her people she became careless, 
and it was not until half her trade had escaped her that 
France was conscious of her loss." We shall see, however, 
how quick France was to act when she found her great 
rival taking the lead of her where she supposed herself 
perfectly unapproachable. Great Britain beheld her in- 
feriority to France and Germany reflected in the Inter- 
national Exposition of 1851 at the Crystal Palace, and, 
instead of being dismayed, set about the most systematic 
and comprehensive plan of art-education the world ever 
'v^itnessed. l^ever has there been an educational enter- 
prise so considerable and so vast, and, from an intelligent 
point of view, never has the effort to instruct an entire 
nation, under similar conditions, been attended with such 
grand results. The English were thought to be indifferent 
to if not incapable of art ideas, and that a long period of 
preparation would necessarily precede any visible results 
of the experiment. But the astonishing rapidity with 
which results have been developed would almost lead us 
to the belief that, instead of being an inapt race, the 
intuitions of art are almost spontaneous in their soul, and 
that they are gifted with a marvelous dexterity in execut- 



42 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

ing them. It is at least certain that this people, whose 
ideal sense was so underrated, has suddenly been trans- 
formed into the leading nation in the products of indus- 
try which depend upon art or beauty. We cannot ignore 
the precision and grandeur of the means by which the 
English nation has secured her commerce and her safety. 

I have confined my attention to one feature only in 
these schools, viz, as a means of cultivating the mechanic 
and useful arts. To this, however, might be added many 
other splendid advantages. ]^o one will deny the refin- 
ing influences exerted upon popular taste by drawing the 
beautiful forms of design, in contemplating the finest 
models, and the chef-d^ce^uvres of the masters in sculpture, 
painting, and architecture. General Meigs was particu- 
larly delighted with what he observed at the Yienna Ex- 
hibition in 1873, in regard to the distinguished excellence 
of the English drawings on exhibition, and he compliments 
them in his report by saying : *' One of the most gratify- 
ing parts of this exhibition was the drawings from the 
English art-schools ; the gradual creeping of art in its 
highest sense into tlie common course of education, thus 
permeating all parts of society, elevating, refining, and 
ennobling our aspirations." 

The same person is often able to execute what he de- 
signs, and then he can see the interpretation of his thought 
in the work of his hands ; and I apprehend this must add 
very much to the enjoyment he experiences in his indus- 
try. Man acts upon man, so that a sympathy naturally 
grows up by which those with whom they work, and 
those for whom they work, have a common sentiment and 
object, that of making things beautiful as well as useful ; 
for the useful can no longer exist apart from the beauti- 



ARTIST AND ARTISAN. 43 

ful. The artist who designs a magnificent building, or a 
masterpiece in painting, enjoys the happiness as well as 
the temperament of genius. It is the same to a degree 
with the minor arts which minister to our daily comfort ; 
and the workman who fabricates a cup, a vase, a bronze, 
or any object of utility in which form, color, and design 
are embodied, experiences an emotion of the same kind, 
and an intellectual pleasure which he makes apparent on 
his work. The art in both cases is of the same general 
nature. Like the leaf and the fruit that grow joined on 
the same stalk, there is a friendly relation. The idea 
comes from the unseen world within — the masterpiece of 
the highest art to please the eye, and the object of utility 
as an accessory to man's happiness. The art of the arti- 
san and that of the artist may differ in the objects to 
which they are applied, but they have so much in com- 
mon that the same fundamental graces and beauties play 
an important part in their respective studies. Art is no 
respecter of persons, and she acknowledges her offspring, 
however humble their origin. She is a powerful en- 
chantress, and is to-day engaged in the personal service 
and gratification of the art-workman wherever employed. 
She not only embellishes his work but his life, and refines 
his industry with an exquisite taste. His sentiments run 
along with his hands and eyes and strike into his very 
temper, making his toil less wearisome, and giving him 
many delightful thoughts and happy moments to relieve 
the burden and perplexity of his labor. 

In a work consecrated to the problem of industrial 
education, I have commenced with a presentation of 
actual facts, and have, therefore, given this brief account 
of what exists abroad. A successful example is of more 



44 EDUCATION m ITS RELATION TO MANUAL- INDUSTRY. 

practical value than the most confident affirmations. What 
is industrial education ? What are its merits and objects, 
and, above all, what power does it possess of administer- 
ing to some useful purpose in the productive arts of life ? 
Now, if we can speak from things we have seen, and 
where the whole problem in question has been worked 
out in all its details^ we can answer these questions with 
exactness and precision, because we know what we are 
talking about. Hence the necessity of consulting suc- 
cessful examples abroad, when they have such a direct 
bearing upon the current facts in our history. 



CHAPTER IV. 

The United States — Dependent upon Europe — Want of trained skill — Our 
cotton and woolen fabrics superior — Pottery and other articles from 
abroad — The material produced in the United States purchased back — 
Russia and other countries — Art pervades all things — Political econo- 
my — Its maxims — American taste for luxury — Cheap lands scarcer — 
Industrial classes must rely upon trades — Effect of making what we 
need — Adam Smith on home-trade — "We should acquire skill — Raise 
wages — Raw material in the United States — Causes of national pros- 
perity — Our natural resources — Practical education — Linen, hemp, 
wool — Other articles — Effect of training industrial classes — The value 
put on material by art — Its general effect — New England — Massa- 
chusetts — Arts and manufactures of — Education in — The Worcester 
Free Institute — The Illinois Industrial University. 

We cannot turn to onr own country without deep 
anxiety, for the subject of industrial education has a spe- 
cial interest for the people of the United States. The 
wealth and prosperity of the nation essentially depend 
upon the extent and perfection of its industry. 

^o modem people, with a country so rich in its own 
resources, has cultivated less sparingly its j)eculiar ener- 
gies. Indeed, an effort to convince our representative 
men of the necessity of industrial education is regarded 
as an equivocal innovation, and in many quarters is met 
with a discouraging sneer ; and it is suggested that 
American enterprise and pluck will supply the deficien- 
cies of ignorance. The example of other nations should 



46 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

serve to rouse us to a sense of our condition, or we shall be 
subjected to all the consequences of a dangerous foreign ri- 
valship. With the means of supplying ourselves, we lavish 
our treasure upon other countries for commodities which 
could be made by our own artisans, if they were properly 
instnicted in the theoretical knowledge of their art. The 
natural resources of the countries upon whom we lavish 
such immense sums are greatly inferior to our own ; but, 
by their system of educational training, they have raised 
themselves to wealth, and made us dependent upon them 
to supply a considerable portion of our wants and luxu- 
ries. Switzerland, with its sterile rocks and arid mount- 
ains ; Germany, with little naturally to rely upon, except 
its sleepless toil and patient industry ; France, that had 
no common school until now ; and England, that cannot 
produce food to feed her own people — ^furnish us with such 
immense quantities of things and conveniences as almost 
to defy belief ; and our importing merchants have their 
agents ransacking the industries of Europe for the regu- 
lation of our markets and the disposition of our resources. 

Our industries are supplanted by those abroad for 
want of well-trained mechanical skill at home ; and this 
will continue, to our superlative disadvantage, until we 
become convinced of the necessity of educational develop- 
ment in our workshops. 

What we need in this country is a correct public 
opinion on the relation of education to industry. When 
this becomes a subject of general interest, a great increase 
of material prosperity may be confidently expected, the 
interchange of the products of ingenuity will be indefi- 
nitely extended, and the influence of individual industry 
upon the general welfare will be widely felt. 



FOREIGN ARTICLES. 47 

The cotton fabrics of the American loom are perhaps 
superior to those of other nations ; and yet we import 
from foreign countries cotton goods of inferior quality, be- 
cause their dyers, designers, and printers can produce a 
finer appearance and more striking effect on account of 
their artistic training. Our woolen manufactures excel in 
durability and firmness, and are now made from material 
grown in our own country ; and yet, from the coat of the 
rich man to the shawl of the lady, whenever fineness and 
delicacy are wanted, or brilliant coloring, or tasteful de- 
sign, the foreign fabric maintains its superiority. Our 
finest articles of pottery, porcelain, and delft-ware, a great 
part of our cambrics and muslins, velvets and silks, rib- 
bons and laces, ladies' dresses and shoes, articles of bronze 
and glass, leather- work, and ornaments of every descrip- 
tion, together with a thousand nameless articles of luxury 
and convenience, must still make a voyage across the 
Atlantic before we can use them. 

It is interesting, in this connection, to remember that 
the raw material in a considerable part of these commodi- 
ties is produced in this country, especially cotton, wool, 
and leather, and exported to Europe, and returned here 
to be purchased by us at four or five times the price 
which we received for it. As a consequence, the skilled 
labor abroad receives the benefit of this prodigious in- 
crease of its value, while our own people, perhaps, remain 
without employment, because they do not possess the 
necessary skill to produce it. Educate our own people in 
the knowledge of these beautiful industries, and, instead 
of paying this vast tribute abroad, we should give em- 
ployment to millions of our own citizens, keep alive the 
spirit of enterprise, give new life to our manufactures, 



48 EDUCATION IN ITS DELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

and build up great seats of industry, such as have fol- 
lowed from the same cause elsewhere. 

At one time Russia, seeing the advantage of creating 
a home market for her own people, prohibited, under 
penalty of confiscation, the importation of all those arti- 
cles which could be manufactured at home. She has 
more recently, as we have seen, discovered a better way 
by which her own people can work up her raw material, 
and reap the benefit of their industry. Her rulers have 
instituted a grand system of technical education, with the 
noble Imperial Technical School of Moscow at the head 
of the organization, and still others of lesser grade, for 
teaching trades to her youth. Indeed, it may now be 
said that there is no civilized community which has not 
recognized the necessity of this policy. Spain, Portugal, 
and Italy, Sweden, Denmark, and Austria, have adopted 
a similar course, and vie with each other in the means 
they offer to instruct those engaged in carrying on their 
national industries. 'No better means could be devised 
for improving the social condition of workmen or advanc- 
ing the general progress of society, for art now pervades 
all the various pursuits of life. The abstract speculations 
of political economy support a system of training which 
would produce skilled workmen for our various industries. 
It must be admitted by all that we should not send abroad 
for articles of consumption which we can manufacture or 
produce as well and as cheaply at home. It seems to be 
an axiom that foreign commerce only produces riches 
when the amount of the exportations exceed in value what 
are imported ; and it is claimed that the country having 
this balance in its favor is conducting a profitable traffic. 
The converse of this proposition is also very generally 



POLITICAL ECONOMY, CHEAP LANDS. 49 

received as a current maxim, viz, that the country which 
buys more than it sells is doing a losing business, and will 
become poorer and poorer as long as it deals at this dis- 
advantage. It is like the man who spends more than his 
income, and must of necessity make up the deficiency out 
of the balance of his estate, if he has one, or run into 
insolvency if he has not one. 

According to this theory, our trade with other coun- 
tries is carried on by changing our products for their 
manufactures as far as they are of reciprocal value, and 
receiving the balance in cash ; and as this balance for 
several years has been very large, our increase in wealth 
has been enormous. Our exports have consisted princi- 
pally though not entirely of breadstuffsj meats, petroleum, 
cotton, and tobacco, while the range of imports embrace 
such an array of manufactured articles that it would be 
extremely difficult to enumerate them. The disposition 
of the Americans to purchase articles of taste and luxury 
has kept pace with our prosperity, and the demand has 
stimulated every branch of industry in the United States 
and many of those in Europe. It is becoming a neces- 
sity that our own artisans should supply this ever-in- 
creasing demand to supply the wants and tastes of these 
fifty millions of people. The time was when the in- 
dustrial classes employed the savings of their wages in 
the purchase of cheap lands for cultivation ; but that 
is no longer practical. Our cheap lands for cultivation 
are becoming scarcer and more remote every year. Yast 
areas are in the hands of individuals and corporations, and 
the operations of agriculture are wrought by costly ma- 
chines which have revolutionized the old system of tillage, 
and introduced an inconceivable rapidity and cheapness 



50 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

of labor. A considerable amount of capital is now indis- 
pensable in order to compete successfully in farming. 
The cultivation of the land cannot be attained on such 
easy terms as when it was nearer and more abundant, and 
it has consequently almost ceased to attract those em- 
ployed in other pursuits. Our industrious classes will 
therefore have to rely more and more upon their trades 
for the means of subsistence, and the proposition is main- 
tained that the best means of securing tliis end and 
of increasing the general industry of society is to train 
and educate them properly in the art of producing, in our 
own towns and cities, articles of as good quality and as 
attractive in appearance as those which are imported. 
The vast amounts which are now expended upon foreign 
labor would, in that case, be distributed among home 
industries, and would greatly multiply domestic employ- 
ments ; while the effect upon all branches of trade, such 
as the baker, the butcher, the merchant, and the banker, 
the farmers, the laborers, those who live in the country, 
and those who dwell in the cities, every class and every 
interest in society, would be to benefit them all in an ex- 
traordinary degree, and to substitute industry for idleness, 
and skill for ignorance, in the useful pursuits of life. 

Adam Smith lays down some views very pertinent to 
this point when he says : " But a capital employed in the 
home-trade, it has already been shown, necessarily puts 
into motion a greater quantity of domestic industry, and 
gives revenue and employment to a greater number of 
the inhabitants of the country, than an equal capital em- 
ployed in the foreign trade of consumption, and one 
employed in the foreign trade has the same advantage 
over an equal capital employed in the carrying-trade. 



ADAM SMITH AND FREE TRADE. 51 

Upon equal or nearly equal profits, therefore, every indi- 
vidual naturally inclines to employ his capital in the 
manner in which it is likely to afford the greatest support 
to domestic industry, and to give revenue and employ- 
ment to the greatest number of people in his own coun- 
try." * 

These remarks, from the highest authority among the 
advocates of free trade, may be unreservedly accepted by 
the friends of industrial education. They express senti- 
ments to which we desire to give the greatest prominence, 
for, if the natural conditions are favorable, it is better to 
produce what is wanted at home than to import it. It is 
no answer to reply to a proposition so plain that we are 
striving for a Utopian condition, in which we will sell 
everything and buy nothing. It is a lesson of practical 
wisdom not to subordinate incessantly our own industries 
and our own markets to those abroad, and to place our- 
selves at the mercy of every foreign enterprise against 
our industrial independence, under the specious pretext 
of maintaining a system of free trade. If any country 
excels us in the manufacture of any kind of goods which 
we need or desire, their influx here is inevitable ; but if 
we have the natural productions and the climate in our 
favor, and only lack the manufacturing skill, would it not 
be wise to acquire that skill, and by that means establish 
a domestic industry which would benefit the whole coun- 
try, rather than to drive a branch of foreign trade which 
is profitable only to foreign labor ? Our imports might 
be diminished, but the national industry would be aug- 
mented, and the particular kind of goods increased among 
our own people, while the change would furnish new 
* " Wealth of Nations," book iv, chapter ii. 



52 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY, 

employments and raise the wages of labor without in- 
creasing prices, for hi^h-paid labor is the cheapest in the 
long run when it is the offspring of skill and science. 
We will get to know the necessity of this conduct when 
we can no longer misunderstand the danger of neglecting 
it. In all countries where the useful arts have made 
large progress, such as England, France, and the United 
States, the productions will be nearly if not quite similar 
in kind, differing only in quality and salability : thus, 
cotton and woolen goods, linens, silks, iron, steel, copper, 
jewelry, porcelain, etc., are manufactured in each of 
these countries, and it is childish to affirm that the natu- 
ral conditions in regard to these commodities are not 
so favorable with the last as with the two others. It 
is by improvement in the arts of production that they 
have acquired a superiority and influenced the trade of 
the commercial world to their advantage. This advan- 
tage will preponderate heavily in favor of both England 
and France as long as we neglect the means which have 
operated wherever the higher industries have flourished. 
There are other causes which influence the growth of a 
nation's prosperity ; the price of land, the cheapness of 
living, the natural productions of the soil, the effect of 
climate, and the cost of the raw material, are not the 
same in aU countries, and the one favored by ^Nature most 
abundantly will possess certain economic advantages as 
compared with the others. We can compare the natural 
resources of the United States with those of any other 
country. All the materials for economic aggrandizement 
are displayed in the vast regions we inhabit ; our people 
are hardy, ingenious, and intelligent, either in peace or 
war. Kelying upon these, we have done little or nothing 



OUR NATURAL RESOURCES. 53 

for the scientific training of skilled workmen, without 
which our magnificent inheritance is in great part ren- 
dered of no avail. The moment has come when we must 
take a firm and solid step for practical education. Ele- 
mentary education is no longer a question. It is a matter 
of knowing what can be done by way of applying it to 
the useful pursuits of the people who work. It is a sub- 
ject in which all citizens of all parties have an interest. 
When other countries are raising the standard of work- 
manship higher and higher, why should we occupy our- 
selves only with the incoberencies of discussion, the 
embarrassments of supplying our wants abroad, and in 
talking of reform ? 

Suppose we manufactured our own Knen, it would 
stimulate tbe supply of flax, which can be grown in the 
United States of as good quality as in Europe ; and 
laborers now idle by the thousand might cultivate the 
crops on land now unused ; while mills and operatives to 
manufacture the fabric and the machinery will introduce 
a great industry. So of hemp, of wool and woolen goods, 
in the production of which we might soon excel the 
Asiatics by the use of ingenious machines, thereby off- 
setting their prodigious supply of manual labor. We im- 
port vast quantities of iron, steel, copper, lead, zinc, and 
the beautiful articles into which all the metals are fabri- 
cated, and yet these materials are found in widely-diffused 
abundance within our own limits. And sometimes it 
happens that multitudes of our own people are suffering 
for want of work, for the simple reason that there is 
greater skill used abroad in these trades than that which 
our own workmen have an opportunity of acquiring. 

The same holds true in regard to fine porcelain, silkS; 



54 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

jewelry, and countless other utilities, whicli can only be 
produced by skilled labor and mechanical science. 

In commenting upon the necessity of industrial edu- 
cation there is no reference intended to the effects of 
free trade or protection. ]Srothing is more common than 
the discussion of that question; but the object of this 
work is to point out the general necessity of training the 
industrial classes to act intelligently upon all industrial 
objects, to make them self-reliant, and ready to put forth 
all their energies to the greatest advantage, and to qualify 
them to contend successfully with the practical dilemmas 
of their every-day business. This condition will also be 
valuable as preparatory of further advances in the useful, 
the ornamental, and the fine arts, for it will represent a 
transitional period in the evolution of grander inventions 
and more intellectual arts, which will relieve labor and 
elevate human intelligence. 

We have seen the effects in Europe of art-education 
in diffusing the spirit of general improvement among the 
mechanic and manufacturing industries. It is possible 
to trace to this source the growth and enlargement of 
wealth and prosperity in the industrial nations. Indeed, 
art is the origin of the first price we pay for all things. 
This is especially apparent in those wonderful triumphs 
of human ingenuity where it has conferred upon materials 
of the most trivial cost a value almost beyond belief. A 
bale of cotton is computed to be worth five hundred dol- 
lars ; but when manufactured, it is supposed to be worth 
two thousand dollars. The baser metals are often con- 
verted, by mechanical art and skill, into forms which as- 
sume a value exceeding their weight in gold. Owing to 
a peculiarity in our domestic habits, the use of glass is 



VALUE BESTOWED BY ART. 55 

immensely extended. The materials of which it is com- 
posed may be said intrinsically to be of no value. Not 
only for table-service, window-glass, and mirrors, but 
also for lamps, chimneys, globes, shades, chandeliers, and 
enameled work, the market in this country is practically 
without limit. Our manufacturers have acquired great 
proficiency, equaling and often surpassing, in strength 
and beauty, any of that made abroad. We have the 
best material possible ; and there is no reason why these 
beautiful fabrics, unless from want of artistic skill, should 
be imported ; yet four millions worth of imported glass 
was consumed last year (1881) in the United States. 

Now, the enormous increase in the value of the raw 
material is realized by the community in which it is 
manufactured. In producing this change, art adapts its 
properties to human use ; the labor of many persons 
is required; it gives employment to both sexes and to 
various grades of industry and skill, and contributes 
equally to commercial prosperity, intellectual progress, 
national wealth, and the beauty and refinement of civil- 
ized life. Other collateral industries grow up in the 
neighborhood to provide the necessary machinery, tools, 
and buildings. The village soon becomes a populous 
city ; the useful arts increase in variety, the lands rise in 
value, and the real wealth of the nation is wonderfully 
enhanced. 

The whole of New England may be chosen as an 
illustration, for there the advancement of useful art has 
been the most remarkable in the United States. Mr. 
Preston, of South Carolina, in a speech made many years 
ago, declared that the only natural productions for ex- 
portation from Massachusetts were granite and ice. Per- 



56 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

haps there is no spot in the land where JS'ature has pro- 
vided so scantily and exacted so much, to make it the 
abode of industry, and yet there is scarcely any other in 
the present age where so vast a trade has been managed ; 
nay, it is not too much to say that her industries are more 
mixed and varied than those of any other quarter of the 
globe of the same narrow compass. Her cotton, her wool, 
her iron, the elements upon which she works ; and her 
corn, and wheat, and cattle, upon which she depends for 
food — all come from States more favored by soil and 
climate. And whoever has traveled in New England and 
observed the number of its great and populous towns, 
and the splendid improvements of almost every spot of 
ground ; the multitudes constantly employed in her fac- 
tories, her furnaces, and workshops, and the numbers of 
her people, all active and busy, may wonder, perhaps, at 
the foundation of her success, for we must know that she 
could not grow rich by exporting granite and ice. The 
ingredients of life and success are few and simple, ^ew 
England grew rich by force of industry, by improvement, 
by education, and the manufacture of the natural growths 
of other States, and by furnishing all parts of the coun- 
try with whatever their wants or their markets demanded 
or invited ; and thus, by her own right arm, she forced 
the greatness of her profits to make amends for the stin- 
giness of Nature. 

In those districts which have become the seats of 
great industries we often find an immense increase in pop- 
ulation and wealth, and, if we do not find a corresponding 
advance in the education of the people, they are apt to 
become overgrown masses of ignorance and moral corrup- 
tion. All accounts agree in ascribing this character to 



NEW ENGLAND. 57 

the crowded manufactories of England, previous to a time, 
quite recent, wlien the spirit of the whole kingdom be- 
came roused up to the necessity of a system of pufclic 
teaching for the benefit of the industrial classes. On the 
other hand, in Massachusetts the maxim was early adopted, 
and has been continually enforced in every period of her 
history, that the more cultivated a man's intellect is the 
more productive is his labor and the better his life. There 
is a commercial as well as a moral value in knowledge, 
for it refines all the senses and passions of the soul, and 
by an inevitable tendency elevates the whole of our hu- 
manity. Of this she is a striking example. Her products 
have not only enriched her at home, but her ideas are as 
prevalent and wide-spread as her notions ; she furnishes 
every quarter of our extended country with teachers in 
schools and colleges, and thus imbues our American 
youth with her educational methods and thoughts. There 
is scarcely a business establishment where her skilled 
workmen are not found, and in all the cities and towns 
of the Middle and Western States her sons hold the first 
rank in position and influence ; they fill the learned pro- 
fessions, lead in commercial industry, and explore every 
avenue of art, trade, and wealth. Indeed, the advantages 
she has obtained constitute a splendid monument for her 
immense efforts in educating her people. As she was the 
first in the world to establish a system of common schools, 
so is she also the first, or at least among the first, to afford 
an example of an institution for the promotion of indus- 
trial science. 

The Worcester Free Institute was founded in 1865, by 
John Boynton, a citizen of Templeton, Worcester County, 
Massachusetts, who gave the sum of one hundred thousand 



58 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY, : 

J 
dollars for its endowment and support. In Lis deed of 

gift he says : " The aim of this school shall ever be the • 

instruction of youth in those branches of education, not ; 
usually taught in the public schools, which are essential 

and best adapted to train the young for practical life, and i 

especially that such as are intending to be mechanics, or : 

manufacturers, or farmers, may attain an understanding • 

of the principle of science applicable to their pursuits, and ' 

will qualify them in the best manner for an intelligent i 

and successful prosecution of their business; and that I 

such as intend to devote themselves to any of the branches ] 
of mercantile business shall in like manner be instructed 

in those parts of learning most serviceable to them ; and i 

that such as design to become teachers of common schools { 

may be in the best manner fitted for their calKng ; and \ 

the various schemes of study and courses of instruction \ 

shall always be in accordance with this fundamental ] 

design, so as thereby to meet a want which our public I 

schools have hitherto but inadequately supplied." The i 

Hon. Stephen Salisbury made an additional gift of two j 

hundred thousand dollars, and said, "This school will \ 

not attempt to turn out in this short period an Arkwright, i 

a Stephenson, or a Fulton, but it may give facilities and I 

helps which these great mechanics did not possess." i 

The Hon. Ichabod Washburn, of Worcester, gave the j 

institute a machine-shop and provided it w^ith its equip- ■• 

ments and a fund of five thousand dollars to be expended | 

for stock, and the interest of fifty thousand dollars to ; 

provide for contingencies. Besides all these advantages, \ 

the locality of the school is highly favorable, for the ■ 
whole neighborhood is extensively engaged in manufact- 
uring arts and trades of every description. I make a 



FREE INSTITUTE AT WORCESTER. 59 

brief extract from the catalogue of 1880, as follows: 
*' The institute has graduated nine classes, aggregating 
one hundred and eighty-six students. The ease with 
which more than ninety per cent of these young men have 
secured honorable and lucrative employment, in stations 
for which their training especially prepared them, con- 
firms the confidence of the trustees in the soundness of 
the general principles upon which the school is organ- 
ized." 

Candidates for admission must give evidence of pro- 
ficiency in the common English branches of learning. 
The course of study embraces a period of three years, 
and, while some studies are pursued by all the classes 
alike, every student has to select at some time during the 
first year some department in which he must devote ten 
hours a week to practice until his graduation — that is 
to say, for two and a half years' students who select 
chemistry, work in the laboratory; the civil engineers, 
at field-work or problems in construction ; those who 
select drawing, in the drawing-room ; and those who se- 
lect physics, in the physical laboratory. The mechanical 
section practice in the workshop to the end of the term ; 
and after the latter have been sufficiently advanced they 
receive instruction in designing machinery, and undertake 
the building of one or more complete machines from their 
own drawing. The class of last year constructed a Cor- 
liss engine ; the class of 1880 made an upright reversible 
engine. Indeed, all the facilities of a first-rate machine- 
shop are offered to the students in this section for obtain- 
ing a practical knowledge of the use of tools, the manage- 
ment of machines, and the theory of their construction. 
In a word, the institution is designed to meet the wants of 



60 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

those who wish to be prepared as mechanics, civil en- 
gineers, chemists, or designers, for the duties of active 
life with the advantages of a solid education. 

The Illinois Industrial University, located at TJrbana, 
Champaign County, Illinois, had its origin in this move- 
ment for the higher education of the industrial classes. 
It is even more richly endowed than the Free Institute 
at Worcester, and to the union of most of the excellences 
of the latter it adds many of those belonging to a uni- 
versity. It has a college of agriculture, in which to 
educate agriculturists and horticulturists ; a stock-farm ; 
an experimental farm, with all the apparatus and breeds 
of cattle ; together with nurseries, orchards, exotics, green- 
houses, gardens, and all that can give practical knowl- 
edge in farming and aid in the development of an agri- 
cultural science. In the college of engineering is the 
school of mechanical engineering. It aims to fit the 
students to invent, design, construct, and manage ma- 
chinery for any branch of manufacture; and the need 
for men is recognized, who, to a thorough knowledge 
of the principles of machinery and of the various motors, 
add the practical skill necessary to design and construct 
the machines by which these motors are made to work. 
There is also a college of natural science and one of 
literature and science; to these are added a school of 
military science, and a school of art and design. This 
last school is represented in the catalogue as having a 
twofold purpose : 1. It affords to the students in the sev- 
eral colleges the opportunity to acquire such knowledge 
of free-hand drawing as their chosen course may require. 
2. It affords to such as have a talent or taste for art, 
the best facilities for pursuing studies in industrial design- 



ILLINOIS INDUSTRIAL UNIVERSITY. 61 

ing or other brandies of fine art. Schools of design in 
Europe and in this country have been found important 
aids to the higher manufactures, adding to the beauty of 
fabric and to the skill and taste of workmen. The in- 
creased interest in the decorative arts and in the manu- 
factures which they require, has added new importance to 
the study of drawing and designing. It is the j)urpose to 
keep this school of design abreast with the best move- 
ments in this direction. The text-books, cabinets, mu- 
seum, gallery of fine arts, laboratories, and workshops — 
indeed, the whole course of studies and the ample staff of 
teachers and assistants — all bear testimony to the practical 
character of the institution, and the careful attention be- 
stowed upon everything connected with the successful 
prosecution of the original design of the founders. 



CHAPTEE y. 

Technical schools in the United States — Massachusetts Institute of Tech- 
nology — Manual School, Washington University — Stevens Institute of 
Technology — The usefulness of these in this country — Scheme of the 
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and course of study — General 
Walker on science schools — The School of Mechanics therein, and its 
course of instruction — Mr. Foley's report — Russian plan of manual 
teaching — The use of hand-tools still necessary — The Manual School 
in Washington University, St. Louis — Its plan of teaching shop-work — 
Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art — Other technical 
schools in Philadelphia — Science schools attached to universities — 
Agriculture and mechanical colleges under land grants — Some statistics 
concerning them — In order to be useful, they must teach by practice — 
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology a good example — Institu- 
tions for the superior education of women — The number of such 
schools in the United States — Every facility should be afforded for 
their education — Brief discussion on this subject — Their employment 
as farmers, decorators, and architects — The numerous trades open to 
women — Emily Faithful's views — Industrial education of women — 
Equality of Education — Co-education — Should women pursue the old 
system of college studies? — This is a utilitarian era — ^Victor Cousin 
on the fine arts — Auguste Comte on science — Other thinkers — The 
Greeks can be studied without studying Greek — Should girls pursue the 
same studies as the boys, in matters of superior education ? — Advan- 
tages of industrial education to women. 

There are several technical schools in the United 
States, similar in character to the science and polytechnic 
schools in Europe — such as the Massacliusetts Institute 
of Technology in Boston, the Polytechnic School of 
Washington University at St. Louis, and the Stevens 



TECHNOLOGICAL SCHOOLS. 63 

Institute of Technology at Iloboken, ]N'ew Jersey. The 
studies in each extend through a period of four years, 
and are to prepare the pupils in the various branches of 
professional engineering, architecture, and chemistry. A 
series of workshops are now attached to each of them for 
instruction in practical mechanics and the use of tools in 
wood and iron-work, so that, when the courses are com- 
pleted, the students are prepared by experimental knowl- 
edge to engage at once in their chosen occupation. The 
studies are pretty mnch the same in all the classes during 
the first year, and the students then take the course 
adapted to their future pursuits. It is somewhat different 
at the institute in Hoboken, as mechanical engineering 
is there the only special study. 

Without going into particulars, it may be briefly said 
that the object in these schools is the special and thorough 
training of engineers, architects, and chemists, in attain- 
ments far advanced beyond the means or knowledge pos- 
sessed by our colleges or universities. This system of 
teaching is called technical, because it involves the appli- 
cation of constructive principles with the greatest exact- 
ness in mechanical structure as well as in execution, so 
that the mechanician and engineer can meet the wants of 
their professions without the mistakes which usually arise 
when experiments are conducted in ignorance of the prin- 
ciples of mechanical powers or motors. Schools of this 
kind are therefore designed for professional purposes and 
professional men alone. And in a country having the 
longest and most elevated bridges in the world, the most 
extended railroads, a system of internal improvements 
that spans the continent, together with the cultivation of 
a steam-power that plows up both land and sea, and has 



6i EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

created an era in every branch of human activity — to 
say nothing of our inventions, our mining, metallurgic, 
and manufacturing interests, and our perfectly adjusted 
and dehcate machinery, which ranks among the wonders 
of the world — it is, I say, among the most practical and 
useful aids to our progress that men should be in the lead- 
ing places who are learned in all that is known of natural 
and mechanical philosophy. And it is gratifying to know 
that teaching to this end has been attended with trium- 
phant results, and that our young men with scientific bias 
need no longer resort to the schools of Europe to learn 
the principles of economic science. 

The main scheme of the Massachusetts Institute of 
Technology is to afford instruction adapted to the wants 
of those who will be engaged in professional pursuits, in 
which a knowledge of some branch of applied science 
is useful or indispensable. Its regular curriculum com- 
prises nine courses, viz., one iii civil and topographical 
engineering; one in mechanical engineering; one in 
mining engineering, or geology and mining; one in 
building and architecture ; one in chemistry ; one in 
metallurgy ; one in natural history ; one in physics, and 
a general course containing several subdivisions. Many 
other branches are also established, such as mathematics, 
the French and German languages, English history and 
literature, political science, international law, mechan- 
ical drawing, stone-cutting, microscopy, photography, 
mechanics, electricity, and a very great list of other de- 
tails and subjects of study, the mere statement of which 
occupies fourteen printed pages in the catalogue of 
1 882-83. Indeed, there is no branch of science, as ap- 
plied to industry, which is not embraced in the courses. 



MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY. 65 

To aid the students in gaining the knowledge specially 
adapted to their intended professions, there are attached 
to the institute museums, collections in natural history, 
geology, and mineralogy, laboratories, and workshops, me- 
chanical patterns, and machinery of various kinds, all of 
which are used to illustrate practically the theory and 
principles of industrial science. In aid of the practical 
studies of the school, and as a means of familiarizing the 
students with the actual details of their studies, they are 
required, in term-time, to make visits of inspection to ma- 
chine-shops, mills, furnaces, and chemical works, and to 
visit important buildings and engineering constructions 
within convenient reach, and in vacations more extended 
excursions are made for the survey of mines and geological 
features, and for the study of metallurgical works and 
noted specimens of engineering. 

The students in the course of mechanical engineering 
are required to devote a considerable amount of time to 
work in carpentry, wood-turning, pattern-making, mold- 
ing and casting, forging, chipping and filing, and j^laning 
and turning the metals ; and all the students in the other 
departments are allowed to take shop-work when the 
time will not interfere with their regular studies. The 
shops and laboratories have been provided with the more 
important hand and machine tools, so that they can ac- 
quire a direct knowledge of the nature of metals and 
woods, and some manual skill in the use of tools and of 
applying science required in a variety of mechanic arts. 
The courses of the institute extend through four years, 
and for proficiency in any one of them the degree of 
bachelor of science is conferred, and the degree of doctor of 
science has been authorized for advanced courses of study. 



66 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

From this brief account, it is seen that the Massachu- 
setts Institute of Technology is devoted to the higher train- 
ing in utilitarian science, and to the cultivation of the in- 
tellectual faculties so as to harmonize the objects of edu- 
cation with the wants and requirements of the age ; and I 
think it is not extravagant to say that its rich and varied 
programmes of study and the attainments and devotion 
of its instructors will compare favorably with many of 
the polytechnic schools in Europe, upon which such im- 
mense sums have been expended. 

Concerning the particular standing of science schools 
in our educational system. General Francis A.Walker, 
who is at the head of this one, is reported recently to 
have said : 

" I would have the highest class of schools that teach 
industrial or mechanical work like our own institute, the 
Sheffield School at Yale, and the Troy Polytechnic, and 
the classical or literary universities and colleges in the 
same grade, the graduates of the mechanic schools con- 
ceded the same standing and as much social recognition 
as the bachelors of arts receive from the world. The 
primary and grammar and high schools should teach the 
rudiments of mechanics as they do the elements of letters, 
so that those who choose to enter the industrial colleges 
shall have that preparation that is essential to success in 
the higher courses pursued there." 

The suggestion here made comes from one who has a 
correct appreciation of the value and purpose of practical 
education. The method he proposes would familiarize 
the students in the grammar and high schools, who desire 
to be received into the technical schools, in the elements 
of mathematics, chemistry, drawing, and mechanics, and 



MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY. 67 

would enable them to pass at once into the full benefits 
of technical lessons. The importance of previous prepa- 
ration is as obvious in regard to these institutions as to 
those of a merely literary character. 

It is a marked feature in this school that, although near 
the oldest seat of learning in this country, it has broken 
away from the beaten track and teaches the material 
forces of the physical world instead of the verbal learning 
of the ancient one. It recognizes and honors the vital 
im]3ortance of the new professional callings and scholar- 
ship which arise out of the altered social condition of men, 
and from the progress of scientific discovery to which 
the world mainly owes its present advanced condition. It 
was planned and organized to imbue its pupils with a 
proper sense of and skill in the great achievements of 
modern art ; and its great service in the work of real 
knowledge will at no distant day elevate it to the educa- 
tional rank and honor of the other colleges and universi- 
ties. 

But the feature of this school which is particularly 
germane to our subject is the mechanical branch, with a 
two years' course which takes the form of systematic 
shop-work, and w^hich is designed for the instruction of 
those who wish to enter upon industrial pursuits rather 
than to become scientific engineers. Many can not afford 
the time and cost for the professional courses who intend 
to follow some one of the mechanic arts, either as a skilled 
workman or as a master-mechanic. All such who have 
completed an ordinary grammar-school course may enter 
the school of mechanics, and continue their general stud- 
ies in algebra, geometry, physics, drawing, and French, 
while a considerable portion of their time will be devoted 



68 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

to learning the use of the typical hand and machine tools 
for working in wood and iron. " The shop-work is con- 
ducted upon a plan designed at the Imperial Technical 
School at Moscow, Kussia, and carried out there with 
most satisfactory results. ... Its exact and systematic 
method affords the direct advantages of training the hand 
and eye for accurate and efficient service with the greatest 
economy of time, and the instruction in the use of tools 
and materials has also proved a valuable aid in intellect- 
ual development." 

During the first year instruction is given in carpentry 
and joinery, wood-turning, pattern-making, and foun- 
dry-work; in the second year, iron-forging, vise-work, 
and machine-tools work. ^Nine hours per week — three 
lessons of three hours each — are devoted to shop-work 
and the balance to other studies, only one shop course, 
except in the case of special shop-students (for whom 
provision is made), being carried on at a time. 

A view of the interior of the workshops is presented 
in the " Special Eeport of the Bureau of Education " on the 
subject of industrial education, commencing at page 148, 
and a series of models is also represented, and numerous 
cuts of pieces used in the course of instruction, which 
convey some idea of their arrangements and the means 
they contain for the practical work of the school. There 
are sixteen molding-benches in the foundry, combined 
with troughs for holding sand, and a cupola-furnace, and 
over it a Sturtevant fan which exhausts the heat and dust 
from the blacksmith-shop beyond. The forging-shop is 
fitted with eight forges and two Sturtevant blowers for 
pressure and exhausting. The machine-tool shop contains 
sixteen engine-lathes of four and a half feet bed, four 



MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY. 69 

speed-lathes, and a Brainard milling-machine. Under 
each lathe is a chest of drawers to hold the tools belong- 
ing to the student using it. The chipping, filing, and fill- 
ing shop contains benches with sixteen vises and other 
needful appliances, with a planer and grindstone. 

The work of manual instruction, however, commences 
in the shop for carpentry, joinery, wood-turning, and pat- 
terns ; and it contains lathes, benches, chests for holding 
the tools, and saws for cutting up the lumber to the 
dimensions needed in the course of the work. First 
comes the use of the saw, and then a series of thirteen 
elements follow, such as a square joint, a miter-joint, a 
dovetail joint, etc., and each student makes a frame to 
apply several of these elements. This is succeeded by 
turning, pattern-making, and a series of manipulations 
incident to the course of instruction. There is also a 
blacksmith-shop, and rooms for chemical and microscopi- 
cal laboratories, a dark room for spectroscope, and one 
for pattern-weaving, which is provided with five looms, 
one of them a twenty-harness and four-shuttle loom, and 
another an improved Jacquard-pattern loom ; and it is 
intended to include other branches and departments as 
soon as circumstances will justify it. 

It is, of course, a matter of great interest to deter- 
mine what has been the experience of the school and the 
result of its work. Upon this point I take from the same 
report the statements of Mr. Thomas Foley, who is in 
charge of the forging vise-work and machine-tool work. 
He says : 

" The system of apprenticeship at the present day, as 
a general rule, amounts to very little for the apprentice, 
considering the length of time he must devote to the 



70 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

learning of his trade. He is kept upon such work as will 
profit his employer, who thus protects himself. If the 
apprentice should be thoroughly taught all branches in 
the shortest time, he would be likely to leave as soon 
as he could do better, letting his employer suffer the loss 
of time devoted to his instruction. 

^' Now, it appears like throwing away two or three 
years of one's life to attain a knowledge of any business 
that can be acquired in the short space of twelve or thir- 
teen days by a proper course of instruction. The dex- 
terity that comes from practice can be reached as quickly 
after the twelve days' instruction as after the two or more 
years spent, as an apprentice, under the adverse circum- 
stances spoken of above. The plan here is to give to the 
student the fundamental principles in such lessons as will 
teach them most clearly, and give practice enough in the 
shortest time to acquire a knowledge of the different 
kinds of tools and various ways of using them. For in- 
stance, if a man can make a small article in iron, steel, or 
any other material perfectly by such methods, he can 
make it of larger proportions with the additional time 
and help required for such an undertaking. The same 
in degrees of heat required for fusing or welding metals : 
if he can do it well in a lesser degree, he can certainly do 
so in a greater, with the additional facilities. 

" After nearly ■B.ve years' experience in the workshops 
in my charge, with the valuable suggestions of the pro- 
fessors so much interested in the success of the school, we 
find the best results in the time allowed accomplished by 
the method now in use in the institute workshops, viz., 
three lessons per week of three hours each. 

" The time is just sufficient to create a vigorous inter- 



MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY. 71 

est, without tiring ; it also leaves a more lasting impres- 
sion than by taxing the physical powers for a longer 
period. We have tried four hours a day, and find that a 
larger amount of work and of better quality can be pro- 
duced in the three-hour lessons. 

'' In order to give each student the proper credit and 
to show him the most important points in each piece, the 
following method has been adopted for inspection. Take 
case of bending, the points to be noted by the student are 
rated as follows : 

Dimensions 25 

Form 70 

Finish 5 



100 



" The most important point in this lesson is the form, 
the next the dimensions, and the last the finish. Through 
all the iron-working and other metals in each shop the 
same method is carried out. Every piece is made to cer- 
tain dimensions laid down upon the drawing. The ob- 
ject of working to dimensions is to establish the necessity 
of correctness in measurement, and is followed through- 
out the course as a very essential point. The most of the 
exercises convey the idea of the necessity of straight lines 
in drawing or lengthening iron and graceful curves in 
bending." 

Mention was made in this account that '* the shop-work 
is conducted upon a plan designed at the Imperial Techni- 
cal School of Moscow, Kussia," commonly called the Rus- 
sian plan. The workshop system of instruction at the Mas- 
sachusetts Institute of Technology is seemingly prepared 



72 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

with the same deliberation and exactness. Its whole 
structure and prospective means of usefulness are appar- 
ently suggested by the Russian exhibits at the great inter- 
national expositions. 

The corner-stone of this plan rests on the faculty of 
induction — that is, a succession of studies in regular 
sequence ; one step leading naturally to the next, to the 
end of the course. When the student understands the 
theory of one task, and can perform it with skill, he is 
put to doing something else. His interest never flags, 
because his work never becomes mere routine or weari- 
some. Single trades are not taught, but the principles 
common to all trades are assiduously inculcated, and are 
at the same time illustrated practically in the workshop. 
The student learns the nature of the materials upon 
which he labors, and the processes by which articles of 
value are wrought through mechanical skill and art. It 
is the same with the theory and use of tools. The func- 
tions of the axe, the saw, the plane, the hammer, the 
chisel, the file, etc., are fully and repeatedly explained by 
competent teachers and skilled workmen, until the science 
of manipulation is thoroughly understood, and all the 
varied forms into which these simple elements can be 
combined by mechanical skill and ingenuity. 

"W"e know, however, that mechanical movements have 
greatly abridged the use of mere hand-tools, especially 
in the manufacturing arts. Masses of red-hot iron are 
wrought into the desired form by machine-hammers. 
The needle and the awl have been converted into ma- 
chines that close up seams with an accuracy beyond the 
reach of human muscle ; and instead of the hand-shuttle, 
the power-loom now weaves our textile fabrics with all 



RUSSIAN PLAN. HAND-TOOLS. 73 

the variety and beauty required by modern fastidious- 
ness. Machinery drives the sharp tool in the planing-mill 
and the delicate one of the Waltham watch-maker. Not- 
withstanding this, hand-tools are still the bases of all 
industrial art. Their actual use is still necessary for 
many important purposes. In fitting, finishing, and mod- 
eling, they are indispensable ; and it is equally true that 
the contrivances we call machine-tools are the same in 
principle as those which are used by the hand of man. 
They have prodigiously increased productive efiiciency, 
and given greater accuracy to mechanical constructions ; 
but whether the tool is used by the hand or placed in a 
frame, it is still a tool, and presents the same principle of 
mechanics. Says Mr. Knight: "Neither the tool nor 
the machine has any force of itself. In one case the 
force is in the arm ; in the other in the water, the steam, 
or the animal that turns the wheel. The distinctions 
which have been taken between a tool and a machine are 
really so trivial, and the line of separation between one 
and the other is so slight, that we can only speak of both 
as common instruments for adding to the eflaciency of 
labor." Indeed, we can hardly form a mental picture of 
a people without tools ; and if we should forget their use? 
it would not be very long before we should have but few 
of the characteristics of civilization, and all the mechani- 
cal giants of our arts and industry would cease to exist 
within a single generation. 

The science of tools is therefore imperative, and this 
is realized in the programmes of hand-labor instruction 
which form so prominent a feature in the technical 
schools at the two Russian capitals, and is regarded as 
matter of the utmost importance in counteracting the de- 



74: EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

teriorating effect of specially adapted machinerj in the 
division of labor. 

The whole j)lan of study received such flattering testi- 
monials at the expositions, and has excited such a remark- 
able degree of interest among the friends of industrial 
education, that notwithstanding its length I feel justified 
in adding, by way of appendix to this chapter, the ac- 
count of the school at Moscow by its director, M. Victor 
Delia Yos, as the best statement of the practical details 
and arguments in favor of that method. 

A school for manual instruction was also established 
in 1879 as a permanent branch or part of the Washing- 
ton University at St. Louis, in which the students divide 
their working-hours as nearly as possible between mental 
and manual exercises. As this is one of the few manual 
training-schools which have been attached to any univer- 
sity or college in the United States, and as, moreover, it 
is claimed to be a successful application of the Eussian 
plan, it may be permitted to present with some detail the 
programme of exercises for the pupils. 

The course of studies covers three years. In mental 
training, instruction is thorough but not extended, and 
would probably correspond with that of our high-schools. 
English language and literature are the only philological 
studies in the course. 

In manual training, special attention is paid to draw- 
ing throughout, embracing three general divisions — free- 
hand drawing, mechanical drawing, and technical drawing 
or draughting — illustrating conventional colors and signs, 
and systems of architecture or shop-drawings. 

Workshop instruction is given in a carpenter-shop, a 
turning-shop, a machine-shop, and a blacksmith-shop. All 



WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY AT ST. LOUIS. 75 

the machinery is diiven by a fine Corliss steam-engine. 
The theory of workshop instruction is so completely set 
forth in the annual catalogue of 1881-'82, and the argu- 
ment in favor of applying education to industry, is so 
carefully and clearly stated, that notwithstanding the 
space it may occupy it is thought desirable to give it at 
some length. 

The results of experience have abundantly confirmed 
the views of the managers of the school, and they declare 
that — 

The zeal and enthusiasm of the students have been 
developed to a most gratifying degree, extending into all 
the departments of work. The variety afforded by the 
daily programme has had the moral and intellectual effect 
expected, and an unusual degree of sober earnestness has 
been shown. Success in drawing, or shop-work, has often 
had the effect of arousing the ambition in mathematics 
and history, and vice versa. 

Progress in the two subjects, drawing and shop-work 
(and we had little previous knowledge of what could be 
done with boys as young as these of the first-year class), 
has been quite remarkable. To be sure there was no 
doubt of the final result, but the progress has been more 
rapid than it seemed reasonable to expect. The second- 
year class contains already several excellent draughtsmen, 
and not a few pattern-makers of accuracy and skill. The 
habit of working from drawings and to nice measurements 
has given the students a confidence in themselves alto- 
gether new. This is shown in the readiness with which 
they undertake the execution of small commissions in 
behalf of the school, or for the students of other depart- 
ments. In fact, the increased usefulness of our students 
is making itself felt at home, and in several instances the 
result has been the offer of business positions too tempt- 
ing to be rejected. This drawback, if it can be called 
one, the school must always suffer. The better educated 



76 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

and trained our students become, the stronger will be the 
temptations offered to them outside, and the more diffi- 
cult it will be for us to hold them through the course. 

Parents and guardians should avoid the bad policy of 
injuring the prospects of a promising son or ward, by 
grasping a small present pecuniary advantage, at the cost 
of far greater rewards in the future. 

Success of the Russian Plan. 

In another important respect, our expectations have 
been more than realized ; namely, in our ability to intro- 
duce class-methods in giving instructions in the theory 
and use of tools. 

All divisions in the shops have thus far been limited 
to twenty pupils, and, as a rule, all members of a division 
have just the same work. 

The exercises have been two hours long, though 
often the students have asked for longer work. It is but 
due to the pupils of the school to say that they have uni- 
formly seconded all efforts looking toward good order and 
good manners. 'No little surprise has been expressed by 
visitors, at seeing how quietly and independently twenty 
boys can work for a couple of hours in the same room. 
An examination of the rules, given on another page, will 
show the care and consideration expected of all during 
shop-practice. Though all classes handle keen-edged 
tools, no serious accident has happened, and very rarely 
have small injuries been received. 

The Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial 
Art provides in the most comprehensive way an advanced 
education in the art of industrial design, especially for 
those w^ho w^ish to take advantage of its facilities to ob- 
tain a thorough knowledge of the application of design to 
manufactures. The course consists of drawing, modeling, 
the study of color, and its application and disposition in 



TECHNICAL SCHOOLS. 77 

design, both in the round and in the fiat. Descriptive 
geometry, as connected with drawing and design, together 
with free perspective, also forms a part of the course ; 
and the students are called upon to prepare original 
designs applicable to industrial purposes in each of the 
branches studied. There is no charge for tuition, and 
either sex may be applicants for admission. 

Several of the technical schools in Philadelphia ex- 
hibit a similar course of instruction, especially the Frank- 
lin Institute and the Spring Garden Institute, and the 
same plan is to be introduced into Girard College. These 
institutions are enlarging their facilities for promoting 
the application of science to the useful purposes of the 
mechanic arts, and are preparing the means to teach the 
students in the use of tools by the actual hand-work of 
construction. 

The growing interest for practical education has 
reached some of the most distinguished universities and 
colleges in the country, the Lawrence Scientific School 
and the School of Mining and Practical Geology at Har- 
vard, and similar institutions at Yale, Columbia, and 
Princeton show how grandly the new philosophy in teach- 
ing — scientific and industrial — has won its way into the 
most conservative and venerable seats of learning. 

Among the newer generation of universities, Cornell 
in the East and Michigan University in the "West, and 
the University of California on the Pacific, were founded 
upon modern opinions, and from the first they established 
courses of instruction, with university honors, for profes- 
sional training in science and mechanics, in mathematics 
and design, and their application to agriculture, to hy- 
giene and to the industrial arts ; and they have already 



Y8 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

attained very great credit by means of the work they have | 

accomplished in these departments. : 

Agricultural and mechanical colleges in the several 
States which accepted the aid of the land grant made 

by Congress for their special endowment, have contrib- , 

uted largely to the movement for education in the indus- i 

trial pursuits and professions of life. The leading object 1 

observed in these institutions is to teach such branches of ; 

learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic i 
arts. They were forty-eight in number in the year 1880, 

with several thousand students, a great part of whom pur- | 

sue studies which deal with the industries. J^early all of ; 

them have extensive farms, nurseries, gardens, and build- : 

ings for agricultural instruction, and a large number have ; 

also provided and equipped workshops in which both i 

practice and instruction in the mechanic arts are system- j 

atically carried on. The report of the Commissioner of I 

the Bureau of Education for the year 1880 gives a de- \ 

tailed statement of their condition, of their resources, i 

courses of study, and attendance. The statistics show that j 

during the previous ten years the number Of instructors : 

had doubled, and the students increased fourfold ; that ■ 

the graduates had multiplied, and generally entered upon I 
industrial pursuits, or engaged in teaching. The whole 

number of schools of science and agricultural colleges in , 

the United States is eighty-three, with 4,421 students in ; 

the scientific and industrial departments, or at the rate of I 

nine per cent of the whole number of students in all the i 
colleges and universities pursuing the regular programmes 
of classical learning. 

If we do not conclude from these facts that technical \ 

education has approached a practical solution in this coun- \ 



TECHNICAL EDUCATION. 79 

try, we can at least declare that it lias made very great 
progress within the last few years, and that the many 
schools for its diffusion have been full of devotion to the 
noble interests confided to their care. We are yet on the 
threshold of these great educational reforms, and many 
problems and difficnlties remain for definitive adjustment. 
But the technical schools are already a very interesting 
feature in our public instruction, and as they increase in 
material and moral resources will work and win their way. 
The colleges and universities have produced Greek and 
Latin scholars, or students in law, medicine, and theology. 
Henceforth, thanks to our technological institutions, there 
will be added to these learned professions, students in the 
industrial economics of life. This is great progress ; tech- 
nical education is an existing fact. It is solidly estab- 
lished. Public opinion goes with it ; and it represents a 
notable reform in our educational methods. I trust the 
time is not far distant when our superior seats of learning 
will have attached to them mechanical branches, so that 
persons who have a mechanical bias can follow their in- 
clination nnder the instruction of the most highly culti- 
vated mechanicians in the world. 

It must, however, be acknowledged that much of the 
usefulness of these institutions depends upon their inti- 
mate relation to the industries of the country. It is feared 
in some quarters that there is a tendency to produce men 
with a high order of mechanical knowledge, but who can 
not use the knowledge they possess because they have no 
practical skill in applying the principles they have learned ; 
and who are, therefore, as mnch out of place in a work- 
shop as any other persons whose hands have never been 
soiled by the handling of a tool. It is the application 



80 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

of mecliaiiical studies that is most needed, and it is this 
adaptation in practice which alone will save those stud- 
ies from being viewed as a mere useless accomplishment. 
The deficiencies in our present system of education 
are said to consist in cramming the pupils with a great 
amount of indigestible information which can be turned 
to no practical account ; and the same objection is even 
now occasionally heard in regard to technical education, 
for it is alleged that it communicates an incoherent mass 
of science without any skill in the workmanship to which 
it is applicable. Perhaps it is difficult to describe techni- 
cal education ; but one thing is sure, the pupils ought to 
be instructed in practice as well as in theory, so that they 
will not look down upon the application of their studies 
to the manual work which gives them their highest 
value.* 

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is an ex- 
ample of such practical instruction, because in addition to 
the study of science, drawing, and composition, nine hours 
shop- work every week is required of each class in carpen- 
try, joinery, wood-turning, pattern-making, vise-work, 
forging, foundry- work, and machine-tool work in a course 

* The object of technical education is to teach the actual method of 
working some particular trade to persons engaged or about to be engaged 
in that trade, but such method is to be taught in a scientific way, and theo- 
retically rather than practically. "Where practical work can be introduced 
to let the students test the theory as they go on, the technical instruction is 
by so much the better. By some persons it is held that unless some practi- 
cal manual work is done by the students, the instruction is not really tech- 
nical ; but this seems to me to restrict the term too much. But be this as it 
may, it is the essence of technical education to teach the theory of a trade, 
and, if possible, to illustrate it by practical work at the same time, in order 
that the student may be both theoretically and practically familiar with the 
business he intends to follow. — Address of W. S. R. McLaren. 



TECHNICAL AND PRACTICAL EDUCATION. 81 

of two years. The students go forth from the institution 
with something better than theories of this or that school, 
or of this or that plan. They are prepared for practical 
work in their trade or profession, and are not required to 
spend half their time in unlearning what they have been 
theoretically taught at school. Many persons think that 
there can be no real technical education unless the sci- 
ences in the programme of instruction can be constantly 
tested in the laboratory or the workshop. Quite a num- 
ber of our schools are approximating to this connection, 
such as we have seen in the Free Institute at Worcester, 
and the industrial department of the Washington Univer- 
sity at St. Louis. It will be largely due to examples of 
this kind that the proper methods of technical education 
will be universally adopted in the United States, for it 
now seems as if this was the only system from which the 
best results can be expected.* 

There are also several institutions intended for young 
women only ; such as the Cooper Institute of Design in 
the city of New York, and the School of Design for 
Women in Philadelphia. It is a gratifying evidence that 
the supposed unwillingness of man to allow women equal 

* As illustrating the progress made in establishing industrial schools, I 
learn since the text was written that the Commercial Club of Chicago have 
subscribed $100,000 for one upon the plan of the St. Louis Training-School ; 
that Cleveland is also taking steps for raising money for the same purpose ; 
and at Terre Haute $500,000 have been donated for a similar institution in 
that town by a private citizen. Manual training is gradually making its 
way into the State University of Georgia, and Minnesota has placed indus- 
trial schools and colleges upon the same footing as respects public support. 

In a short time after the training-school has been in general operation, 
we shall have intelligence and fineness of work which those who have been 
brought up under the present slip-shod method of learning a trade never 
dreamed of. 

5 



82 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

educational advantages exists only in tradition ; since the 
first of these schools was founded by the generosity of 
Peter Cooper, and the other has been aided through all 
its difficulties by the liberality of private citizens, and the 
devoted labors of T. W. Braidwood, the principal of the 
school and its chief instructor. The object of both is the 
same : " The systematic training of young women in the 
practice of art, and in the knowledge of its scientific prin- 
ciples, with a view of qualifying them to impart to others 
a careful art-education, and to develop its application to 
the common uses of life, and its relations to the require- 
ments of trade and manufactures." 

In the two hundred and twenty-seven institutions va- 
riously denominated schools, seminaries, and colleges re- 
ported by the Commissioner of Education in 1880 for the 
higher instruction of women, there is the greatest diversity 
of means, methods, and resources. Not a few of them 
provide for college courses of study, but it is impossible 
to learn to what extent they have recognized the impor- 
tance of industrial education beyond the fact that music, 
drawing, art, and popular science are placed in their true 
rank among the studies to be pursued in all of them. 

Good sense and equity require that every desirable 
facility should be afforded to complete the education of 
woman according to her prospects in the future, and such 
as will form her judgment, correct her ideas, and provide 
her with some skill to fill the occupations to which she is 
destined. Give her the appropriate instruction, and it 
will be for her to do the rest. Special schools for the 
practical education of woman are founded upon inevitable 
qualities in her will, disposition, and bodily conformation. 
These constitute a rule of Nature against which human 



SPHERE OF WOMAN'S EDUCATION. 83 

laws will not prevail ; and it is becoming clear that 
methods and routines ought to be determined by what is 
best adapted to her condition and wants. For thousands 
of years she has moved in a limited circle — at first as a 
drudge, and afterward in domestic life and dependent cir- 
cumstances. These schools give her a chance ; they are 
like the opening of a new world to young women all over 
the land, who have to earn their living. They afford them 
an opportunity of obtaining an education suitable to their 
circumstances and the times in which they live. It is very 
fine to speak of home as the only appropriate sphere of 
the sex ; and all will agree that their highest and divinest 
gifts are displayed when they are the center of a domes- 
tic household made harmonious by their wisdom, discre- 
tion, and love. There is no sight more beautiful. But 
nothing will make home more delightful than when its 
chief ornament has received the advantages of a practical 
education. Every lady should be taught something useful. 
It will enable the wife to make the home more attractive. 
She will be more intelligent, a better companion, and more 
loved as a mother or as a friend. Her dormant faculties 
will be drawn out and cultivated, making her stronger for 
good ; and, when the storms of life come, she can brave 
its dangers, and struggle successfully with its disasters. 
There is scarcely a sadder sight than the condition of 
a woman who has been taught only in the fashionable 
methods of the day, when misfortune has swept away her 
accustomed means of ease and luxury. Her delicate fin- 
gers which have been used only for the display of rings, 
and her soft white hands can not, in nine cases out of ten, 
be used for practical purposes. She can select no pursuit, 
for she knows none. And while J^ature calls for work of 



84: EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

infinitelj varied character, suitable for the support of all 
her offspring, this poor woman knows no kind of useful 
labor. 

Besides these, there are multitudes of joung women 
who have to earn a living before getting married, and 
many more who never get married at all. They do not 
wish to spend their lives in domestic service, and they re- 
fuse to be a burden upon relatives who can ill afford them 
a support. Now, if the proper course is taken to render 
them competent, there is almost an infinite number of 
employments which are suitable for their sex, and upon 
which they can successfully enter. Indeed, they can 
almost choose their own pursuit, even to learning a trade. 
Many prefer to study the arts, some take to science, and 
others turn to teaching. Not a few of the employments 
that have been considered masculine are simple and easily 
acquired, and offer attractions to woman's industry and 
taste. It is admitted that she has exhibited skill, and pa- 
tience, and sublime fortitude in family concerns and trials, 
and any man would be foolish who would not repose con- 
fidence in her judgment, clear-sightedness, economy, and 
business ability in matters appertaining to domestic life. 
Why, then, may she not exhibit the same qualities in 
wider fields of usefulness ? In pecuniary transactions she 
can be trusted beyond man. Why, then, should she not 
liave a place in the counting-room and the banking-house ? 
We know that many women have very great business 
capacity. Why, then, may they not be employed in many 
branches of trade and commerce ? A woman is not ex- 
pected to perform much out-door labor, but her skill in 
agi-iculture is undeniable. She perceives quickly and acts 
from intuition. She understands easily the nature of 



SPHERE OF WOMAN'S EDUCATION AND WORK. 85 

plants, but having no scope slie expends her care upon the 
flowers of the garden, the greenhouse, or the orchard. 
She is a natural horticulturist and cultivator. Fruit-trees, 
shrubs and parterres, foliage and verdant lawns, and all 
the graceful caprice of trees and creeping herbage, present 
to her appreciative eye the most pleasing and fanciful 
combinations. She knows, as if by instinct, how to care 
for growing animals and fowls, and how herbs should be 
gathered, and fruits ripened and packed and marketed. 

And then, again, the whole field of decorative art is 
open to her taste and genius. Her capacity to occupy it 
is intimated by her love of ornament, her appreciation of 
graceful forms, of charming contrasts, of beautiful fres- 
coes and paintings, and of elegant furniture and draperies. 
The refined state of the decorative arts is conspicuous in 
the elaborate splendor lavished upon the dwellings of the 
rich and refined residents in our towns and cities. The 
principles of design upon which they depend can be ac- 
quired by the exercise of ordinary care and diligence; 
and if women were equally willing to carry on this work, 
they are as competent as men, and perhaps could excel 
them in these beautiful productions. 

The same may be said of the study of architecture. 
The act of acquiring a knowledge of its elementary prin- 
ciples involves endowments with which woman is finely 
gifted. She draws and designs with ease and elegance. 
Eminently perceptive and poetical, she could interpret 
her ideas into domestic buildings, and imbue them with a 
kind of life, and make their walls and proportions speak 
of her imaginative and romantic feelings. Our edifices 
would receive a more pleasing combination than is pro- 
duced by the reasoning faculty, which is alone exercised 



86 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

by man in bis building designs. Sbe would feel tbe best 
tbing to be done in tbe number and arrangement of apart- 
ments, for wbo but a woman can know a woman's wants ? 
Yet sbe bas been completely ignored in building tbe 
bouse, and bence w^e bebold in almost every dwelling 
clumsy proportions and styles more or less vulgar and 
false. Indeed, tbe finest structures are often tbe most 
destitute of any sense of comfort. Let woman be trained 
and practiced in bousebold arcbitecture, and you would 
see sentiment wbere tbere is now a dry detail of brick and 
stone, and a cbarming nicbe or a cozy recess in every 
empty space ; and ber appreciation of beautiful forms, of 
graceful details and picturesque outlines would appear in 
tbe mansion wbere sbe berself is tbe cynosure of all witbin 
its circle. 

Besides tbese, tbere are drawing, wood-carving, mod- 
eling, ceramic painting, and otber brandies of art, pot- 
tery, tbe wbole field of designing and ornament, working 
in leatber, design, repousse^ painting, and an indefinite 
number of employments suited to ber capabilities and 
bealtb, all of wliicb are made possible by tbese training- 
scbools for women, sbowing tbat tbere is no sex in work 
except ability and adaptation. 

New trades are opened every year to women. Tbe 
census of 1880 sbows tbat tbey are employed in a great 
variety of work; sucb as tbe manufacture of artificial 
featbers and flowers, book-binding, sboe-work, tailoring, 
dress-making, confectionery-work, twine-making, corset- 
making, fireworks, canning vegetables and fruits, dressing 
skins, making bosiery, matcbes, cigars and cigarettes, mod- 
el-making, pbotograpbers, telegrapbers, plumbers, pipe, 
elastic, and pocket-book makers, sbirt-makers, pump and 



! 

I 



SPHERE OF WOMAN'S EDUCATION AND WORK. 87 

refrigerator makers. There are also female doctors, 
preachers, insurance agents, and trained nurses for the 
sick, type-setters, writers, authors and poets, artists, 
painters and sculptors, bank presidents, cashiers, and treas- 
urers.* Many women, young and old, are doing good 
work, and earning good wages, in these various employ- 
ments. And the better the work the more it pays. E'o 
work is so costly as cheap work, and to this end the girls 
should have an education suited to these new opportuni- 
ties, and we ought to be sufficiently liberal and enlight- 
ened to see that they also get a general industrial training. 
Says Emily Faithful, in a recent conversation with a gen- 
tleman : 

My " policy," in short, has been simply this : I started 
from the proposition that women are human beings, in- 
dividuals, with individual needs and rights. To supply 
these needs and maintain these rights the world's work, its 
remunerative industries, must be open to them as freely as 
to men. I do not underrate marriage nor domestic life. 
I think it is the highest and happiest state for any woman, 
when it is entered into under the proper conditions and 
relations. But many women have no vocation for domes- 
tic life ; many who have the vocation have not the oppor- 
tunity. To them the industries must be opened, and to 
how many a woman the ability to be herself a producer 
increases the opportunity for marriage by increasing her 
heritage of desirable qualities! Her ability to earn is 

* In his "Easy-Chair" gossip, in "Harper's Magazine" for August, 
1883, Mr. Curtis refers to the State of Massachusetts, where it is announced 
that there are two hundred and eighty-four occupations open to women, 
and that 251,152 women are earning their own living in these occupations, 
receiving from $150 to $3,000 each every year. This computation does not 
include amateurs, or mothers and daughters in the household, and, of course, 
excludes domestic service. 



88 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

equivalent to a dower — if we look at marriage from a 
purely prosaic point of view. 

The whole subject of industrial education, in its rela- 
tion to woman, is here suggested, and in a great measure 
begun. A false standard of social life has not permitted 
her to engage in any truly useful labor, or even to teach 
her children in the smallest detail of practical knowledge. 
This absurdity will soon have a severe gauntlet to run, 
and something more will be required of our ladies than 
to play on the piano and make a formal round of calls, 
while the husband is deeply immersed in his business 
pursuits. Let no one think that the author is unfriendly 
to the refinements of polished society, or disposed to un- 
derrate the importance of its graces and embellishments. 
But surely all ought to consent at this time to give quite 
as much regard to the special training of women in the 
various departments of useful labor for which she may be 
fitted, as to any other subject affecting her welfare, and 
that this is among the questions of the day which require 
an unbiased and enlightened consideration. 

Indeed, many of the questions concerning the liberal 
education of women have an answer in these noble institu- 
tions, and there is now a tendency in public opinion in 
favor of their admission to every educational advantage 
enjoyed by the other sex. In England, colleges have 
been established for girls with college courses of study, 
identically the same as those pursued in colleges for young 
men, and the great Universities of Oxford and Cambridge 
have provided for the university education of women, and 
the London University makes no distinction in sex in be- 
stowing its degrees. In the United States we find some 



SPHERE OF WOMAN'S EDUCATION AND WORK. 89 

of our colleges taking tlie same course, and in others they 
are admitted on the same footing to the same studies, and 
even to the same classes as the boys. We do not stop 
now to discuss the problem of co-education in superior 
courses of instruction ; that is being worked out as a prac- 
tical question in several institutions, and I have not the 
imprudence to engage in that discussion at present. It 
may be remarked, however, that the general result shows 
that the dangers predicted from co-education have not 
been realized, and that the system is still viewed as favor- 
able to both sexes. This is the conclusion reported at the 
Cornell University, and at the Michigan University, where 
co-education has existed for several years. 

This, however, is not the end of the question. No 
doubt the girls will compare favorably with the boys, and 
quite likely excel them, especially where the studies are 
of a character to exercise the memory. The friends of 
co-education have our sincere sympathies, but we fear 
they overlook a very material consideration; and that is, 
whether the college courses of studies constitute a true 
and wise system of instruction for girls. It is a pro- 
found conviction pervading society at this time, that the 
greatest ignorance of every useful art or profitable acquire- 
ment marks the notorious incompetency of young men 
who have received a college degree. They have spent the 
precious period of youth in painful and laborious studies 
which, in the progress of modern learning, have become 
obsolete. The connection between any period of civiliza- 
tion and its accompanying methods of education should 
be as true of this age as of any one that has preceded it. 
This is an era of utilitarianism, and perhaps this country 
is very much so. Education should, therefore, be com- 



90 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

paratively utilitarian. But it is thought bj many that we 
are given over to an excess of utilitarianism and scientific 
realism, at the expense of refinement and beauty. This 
exaggerated attention to the useful will not appear to be 
unfriendly to the ideal when we bear in mind that when- 
ever the arts of necessity have been appreciated, sculpt- 
ure, painting, design, and ornamentation have flourished 
most, and something of their beauty has been transferred 
to the common articles and uses of life. The remedy for 
industrial realism, remarks a writer in the " Revue des 
Deux Mondes," is to make things beautiful as well as use- 
ful, and of scientific realism to teach the true intelligence 
of things, and their immediate applicability to the pur- 
poses of human life. Yictor Cousin thinks that the fine 
arts are too disinterested and sublimated for use. They 
are only for beauty, and to inspire a sense of the ideal. 
Fortunately, he limits them to three only — painting, sculpt- 
ure, and poetry ; and these, he thinks, should be entirely 
emancipated from everything except the unity and grand- 
eur of art. This does not agree with the ideas of classical 
art, for the Greeks, who were the founders of all art, in- 
cluded music, rhetoric, letters, eloquence, philosophy, and 
the dance among the Sacred Nine, and made them all co- 
ordinate with the needs and servitudes of life. They con- 
stituted a practical part of Greek education, and entered 
into almost everything of value or interest in their daily 
history. 

The same exclusiveness has been claimed by Auguste 
Comte for the influence of science, who says that the prog- 
ress of analysis has tended constantly to specialties in sci- 
ence, which ends too often in extinguishing the ardor for 
science which should be cultivated for itself alone. 



SPHERE OF WOMAN'S EDUCATION AND WORK. 91 

It would appear, from the reflections of these philoso- 
phers, that all attempts to apply fine art or high science 
would be to invade their proper domain, and to destroy 
the sense of the ideal; and that to employ them for any 
useful purpose, under the pretext of imitation or design, 
would be to degrade the standard of their infinite perfec- 
tion. On the other hand, such thinkers as Helmholtz, 
Tyndall, Huxley, and Spencer teach that practice has its 
sources in the most elevated and fruitful speculations ; 
and we know that the greatest artists have embellished 
useful articles with the work of their hands. All knowl- 
edge is valuable only as it contributes to the elevation and 
happiness of man, and all art is useful because a necessary 
requisite to our social advancement. They warm the 
genius and the heart by their exquisite beauty, and evolve 
those delicate perceptions which lead to cultivation and 
refinement. Herbert Spencer has remarked that, without 
painting, sculpture, music, poetry, and the emotions pro- 
duced by natural beauty of every kind, life would lose 
half its charm. So far from useless are the training and 
gratification of the tastes, that the time will come when 
they will occupy a much greater share of human life than 
now. 

But to return from this brief digression to the superior 
instruction for girls. Now, if its object is to prepare them 
for useful work, and for a life of self-help and self-sup- 
port, certainly the study of a dead language can not be the 
best preparation for either. To get out a few lines of 
Latin verse by aid of a lexicon, or to be able to parse an 
Athenian apothegm in the original, with a Greek grammar 
in hand, is a very inadequate return for the years of toil 
that must be employed in the acquisition. The more the 



92 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

collegian studies, the less he knows of real things. He 
can turn his hand to nothing unless it be to teach others 
in the same blind way, or to crowd his way into profes- 
sions already full of those unfitted for them, often from 
this very cause. To be fed as a clerk, or make a living 
by his wits, is not the end for which one should undergo 
so much drilling. To compel girls to go through this 
labyrinth of language, with a modicum of logic and rhet- 
oric, is progress backward, and the reverse of a true re- 
form. Besides, one can study the Greeks without study- 
ing Greek. We admit that Greek civilization is imper- 
ishable, because it was original and natural. We know 
that it continues to influence modem society because it 
seized upon the spirit of humanity once for all. We wit- 
ness its intimate incorporation in our refinement and 
habits. Our sculptors study its marble legacies; our 
scholars honor its philosophy ; and many of the precepts 
of our daily life have come down to us from its wisdom. 
The political systems which ruled its little divisions, the 
intellectual characteristics of the people, their social and 
religious institutions, their history and achievements in 
arts and letters, have been elaborated again and again by 
historians, philosophers, and translators in all languages. 
From these we can learn all that is essential to know. 
The argument that the classics should be pursued for their 
power and influence as an intellectual discipline, without 
regard to any other criterion of their usefulness, has only 
the prejudices of centuries to support it. The question 
of education to-day is, not only to discipline the mind, but 
to prepare men for the active spheres of industrial and 
scientific pursuits, to augment their efiicacy in producing 
wealth, to exert an influence in checking evil, and pro- 



I 



SPHERE OF WOMAN'S EDUCATION AND WORK. 93 

moting good. Few boys, in their after-career, ever apply 
a Greek or Latin quotation to any practical purpose. To 
men who intend to become professional scholars classical 
studies will probably be useful, and certainly will set off 
their accomplishments with great decorative effect. Let, 
therefore, ample provision be made for their critical study 
in our universities. But I respectfully submit that the 
time has arrived when they should be optional studies 
only, and should no longer be a condition of admission. 
But a Httle more of this in the sequel. 

In primary education the lessons are necessarily the 
same for both, but it seems to be somewhat different when 
it is a matter of superior education. The question of com- 
mon studies is a very different one from that of the equal- 
ity of sexes. Boys and girls are of the same race, they live 
on the same air, eat the same food, and are subject to the 
same laws of life and health, and yet a boy is a boy, and a 
girl is a girl,and I think that women must get over the idea 
of pursuing a study simply because men choose to do it, 
or are compelled to do it. While I would exclude woman 
from no work or study she might prefer, yet there are 
some in which her peculiar powers and aptitudes fit her to 
excel, and of which her circumstances in after-life require 
the constant application. For instance, the great majority 
of women are destined to become wives and mothers. 
The arts of domestic life, and the correlated sciences will, 
therefore, have a bearing, not only upon their whole life, 
but upon that of their families. Aside from household 
duties, there are a multitude of questions in domestic 
hygiene, physiology, and in regard to the dwelling, the 
diet, the clothing, and their relation to the climate, and 
the season, and the atmosphere, which will open up a field 



94 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

of the most splendid and useful information. The educa- 
tion of women, in this general knowledge of practical 
principles, presents a wide contrast to the mental training 
of a girl in an ordinary boarding-school. At a meeting 
of the French Academy, Dr. Dally read a paper, not long 
since, in which he showed how careless and forced habits 
of posture produce deformity of the vertebrae of the neck 
and loins, and finally a curvature of the spine. He adds 
that this is more usual and prolonged with girls, for they 
are, generally speaking, required to remain seated for 
longer periods than boys, and the germ of some distortion 
is often left for life, and that these ills are more likely to 
occur at the period of youth, when the bony structure has 
not acquired the strength to properly support the rapidly- 
increasing weight of the body. 

These remarks are confirmed by observation, and 
in ninety-nine cases in a hundred the tendency to distor- 
tion was formerly given when the girl was under the dis- 
cipline of a school for " young ladies." 

'No doubt sounder principles now very generally pre- 
vail in our schools. An English traveler in this country 
writes as follows to a London paper : " Last fall and win- 
ter I visited many of the schools and colleges in the 
United States. I was especially struck with Mount 
Holyoke College, in Massachusetts. The curriculum of 
study there is sound and deep, rather than extensive, 
while the household work is performed by the girls. I 
never saw a brighter or healthier-looking set of young 
women in any school or college anywhere." 

A great change is observable. It is becoming clear in 
the light of common sense, that a knowledge of the laws 
of health and of the science of domestic life are equally 






WOMEN'S EDUCATION. 95 

invaluable to woman as a mother and a wife. Women 
must do much for their own sex. They know better than 
man its trials, its wants, and aspirations. A fuller educa- 
tion will develop their faculties, and there seems no reason 
why a college system could not be adapted for their in- 
struction. I do not believe that the industrial education 
of women will lessen the grace or refinement of their 
nature, but, on the contrary, it will enable them to enter 
upon new fields of duty, develop their natural aptitudes, 
apply their powers to such acquisitions as will be most 
useful and interesting, and at the same time qualify them 
to fulfill all the relations arising out of domestic circum- 
stances. (See Appendix.) 



CHAPTEE YL 

Education for hand and eye — Method of in3truetion at Athens — Public 
schools — Improved methods — Main facts in regard to public schools — 
Optimistic views of the same — Other lessons than those of the school- 
room — Statement of the same — Our obligations to the public schools — 
Want of practical education — Manual training a necessary part of— For- 
eign designers and workmen — Jewelers' Association — Speech at banquet 
of — Necessity of art-education to American artisan — Mechanic arts pass- 
ing out of our hands — Rush for clerical employment — An illustration 
of their dependence — Decorative art — Science apphed to necessities — 
Telegraphy, photography, aniline — Artistic employments, their effect 
— ^Education enhanced by manual exercise — Eclectic education — The 
highest aim — Intellectual culture not alone education — Our physical 
constitution — Description of — Association of, in elevating the mind — 
In expressing its ideas in tangible forms — Their intimate co-operation 
— Equality of education, the true method — Standard of education in 
Europe — Commensurate education — ^Duty of the State — Conclusions 
from, classified — First, second, third, fourth — Technological education 
— Not for the mass of children — Object of studies — Right of the State 
— American Institute of Instruction — ^Use of tools — Reforms in mat- 
ters of education difficult — Science in the colleges. 

However mucli we may differ about the causes or the 
remedies, it is manifest that this branch of education has 
been entirely overlooked until quite recently. Intellect- 
ual studies, as they are called, have alone been thought 
worthy of being introduced into our systems of instruc- 
tion, while eye and hand culture have not only been dis- 
regarded, but absolutely looked down upon with a lofty 



EDUCATION AT ATHENS. 97 

scorn. 'No just conception can be liad of their immense 
value to our structure without their co-education with the 
brain ; their joint sphere of action embraces all employ- 
ments, the sciences, the arts, agriculture, manufactures, 
and inventions, together with the application of all these 
to the necessities and enjoyments of society. To their 
combined influence and intimate co-operation we owe the 
conveniences of life, and the masterpieces of art. In this 
view it is impossible to discern under what guise these 
executive organs of the mind — these twin-sisters of the 
soul — are not to be considered as having something to do 
with education. We teach our young men to repeat 
Greek verses ; but it is hardly possible to conceive of a 
greater contrast in the matter of education than we pre- 
sent to the ancient method of instruction. The youth of 
Athens were made the recipients of a practical scholar- 
ship. They were not required to study two dead lan- 
guages for the best period of their school-days. The 
human structure was regarded as a whole, and instructed 
as a whole. The court of the Areopagus appointed mas- 
ters to superintend the education of children, and on this 
they bestowed the most particular attention. Games, 
gymnastics, and exercises were prescribed for the young 
men, that their bodies might be expanded and strength- 
ened, and all parts of the frame developed in harmony 
with the higher faculties of the mind. Hence came their 
superlative beauty of person, their hardihood, their endur- 
ance, and physical health. They were afterward taught 
by public masters in the rules of art, and this was a ma- 
terial object in the education of all the citizens. They 
were instructed, from first to last, in the duties of morality 
and religion, the respect due to parents, a reverence for 



98 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

old age, and the strictest obedience to the laws. The love 
of country and the sentiments of patriotism were assidu- 
ously inculcated, and a knowledge of the laws was con- 
veyed by the most imj)ressive lessons. Socrates imbued 
them with wisdom, Plato with philosophy, and Phidias 
with art. 

'Now, if it be true that history is philosophy teaching by 
example, what standard of education do we find at Athens 
to justify our own ? Shall we do nothing but copy the 
Parthenon in our public edifices, and their tongue in our 
scientific nomenclature? A painter, who only copies, 
will never be a true artist, and one who only translates 
will never be a poet, and one who only imitates will never 
be a philosopher. A tree grows from the strength of its 
vitality, the propitiousness of soil, and the accidents of 
sunshine and rain in the spot where it is planted, and not 
from the growth and richness of a distant forest. The 
American boy is only half educated, or educated in one 
direction, that is, mentally, and scarcely at all in the di- 
rection which still makes Greece the silent companion 
and instructor of mankind. Even intellectual culture, 
itself, must depend upon the enrichment of the intuitive 
powers, and not upon imparted ideas; or, in other 
words, the capacity of deduction should not be sacrificed 
to verbalism and memory. It is the mission of a prac- 
tical education not only to impart the elements of knowl- 
edge, but to draw forth the faculties, and train them to 
act intelligently and successfully in all the circumstances 
of life. 

No one who studies the marvelous history of the pub- 
lic-school system of education in the United States, can 
fail to acknowledge its extraordinary influence upon the 



PRESENT SYSTEM OF PUBLIC EDUCATION. 99 

weKare of the people. J^ew England has been referred 
to as an example. Founded in our early settlements, its 
progress has been too slow to suit the fervent wishes of 
our critics. Undoubtedly important changes must be in- 
troduced, suited to the changed conditions of the age. 
But surely we can have no sympathy with the tendency 
to injure or destroy this vast agency for good, because it 
continues to do that good under circumstances that were 
not foreseen, and could not have been anticipated. Any 
candid observer will admit the process of improvement 
going on within the last few years. JSTot only are tlie 
pupils trained in the art of drawing, which Hes at the 
foundation of all constructive industry, but they are 
imbued with the rudiments of popular science and me- 
chanics; and these improvements demonstrate that the 
necessity of change has been accepted as a part of a valu- 
able system ; and a fair way is thus opened for still 
greater progress in making public education a fitting 
preparation for useful pursuits afterward. It is better to 
be a little behind the age than encounter the dangers of 
mere empiricism, and if some of our home critics declare 
the common school a great failure, let us remember that 
the best and greatest in our own land, and the most keen- 
sighted and intelligent in Europe, declare that there is no 
American institution that they so much admire. 

It will not be supposed that, in referring to the de- 
ficiencies of the public-school system, there is any design 
to underrate its general effect, but rather that it should 
be reconstructed in a manner suitable to the times. 

Let us state some of the main facts. We expend, say, 
in round numbers, $100,000,000 per annum upon the sup- 
port of public schools. Our school property may be valued 



100 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

at not less than $200,000,000. Splendid school-buildings 
five stories high, with libraries, and all kinds of con- 
veniences and apparatus for literary education, grace and 
adorn the most beautiful spaces in our cities ; and hum- 
bler ones are seen in all the rural districts of the North 
and West ; and, notwithstanding this immense outlay, we 
are obliged to rely upon foreigners in nearly all the indus- 
trial arts that depend upon technical information. 

l^ow, if the object of education is to prepare the pupils 
for useful and successful work, certainly our present sys- 
tem can not be the best preparation for the wide-working 
world of to-day. Great as this burden is, the American 
constituents bear it more cheerfully than they do any other 
pubhc tax, for they thoroughly believe in the general ex- 
cellence of public instruction ; but the need of this kind of 
knowledge which it has failed to supply would seem to 
call for a deep and critical inquiry into the competency 
of our present system of education, with the view of still 
further extending, in the direction of present wants, the 
changes and improvements commenced, as we have seen, 
with great vigor in some quarters. All intemperate haste 
on this subject is out of place. The fact has attracted 
men's attention, and, no doubt, when the changes already 
made shall have had sufficient time to develop into practi- 
cal results, more important improvements still will be ex- 
tended where most needed. These schools have not been 
made : they have grown. They have become what they 
are through the course of ages, and they are still growing 
more and more into the active life of the people. Have 
patience, brother, and we will yet see the ideal school, or 
at least a near generation of our children will ! 

It is often said, in reply to suggestions of this kind. 



LESSONS OF LIFE AND EXPERIENCE. IQl 

that we are not to expect everytliing from the school- 
master. This expression has become stereotyped. The 
family and the world are also teachers, and the lines of 
Goethe express the great truth that life is the school of 
manhood : 

A noble man may to a narrow sphere 

Not owe his training. In his country he 

And in the world must learn to be at home, 

And bear both praise and blame, and by long proof 

Of contest and collision nicely know 

Himself and others — not in solitude, 

Cradling his soul in dreams of fair conceit. 

A foe will not, a true friend dare not, spare him ; 

And thus in strife of well-tried powers he grows, 

Feels what he is, and feels himself a man. 

It is also true that the American citizen has other les- 
sons than those imparted in the school-room. His mind 
is constantly called into exercise by the greatest of all 
teachers — experience. He has to estimate the advantages 
and disadvantages arising from the administration of pub- 
lic affairs, and by this mental exercise he acquires much 
knowledge, and an expansion of ideas. He acts as a voter, 
a juror, and as an official ; he is called upon to scrutinize 
the current events and the symptoms of the times ; he 
keeps a sharp eye upon the markets, and discusses, or 
hears others discuss, the relations of labor and capital, and 
watches public movements with more or less attention ; 
and thus he acquires knowledge on a great variety of 
topics, and his reflections embrace a wide field of observa- 
tion. Perhaps there is no country in the world where so 
many books are sold. Newspapei*s are everywhere sup- 
ported, and they dilate upon all branches of science, his- 



102 EDUCATION IN ITS KELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

tory, politics, morals, poetry, art, pliilosopliy, and woman's 
rights ; and, notwithstanding all drawbacks, they perform 
their part in carrying on the great work of educating the 
public mind. While the churches are earnestly engaged 
in building temples, colleges, and schools for instruction 
in their various tenets, they also support a vast ministry, 
publish books and pamphlets for distribution, and so dif- 
fuse through almost all ranks of society a great amount of 
secular information, and a salutary influence upon the life 
and morals of the people. Then there are addresses upon 
public occasions, and popular lecturers who must keep up 
with the spirit of the times, and cultivate a cordial sym- 
pathy and understanding with the masses. To these 
means of informing and educating the people might be 
added public libraries, museums, congressional debates, 
literary and scientific societies, popular assemblies, and 
conventions for all conceivable purposes. 

Such, in a general way, on the larger scale of practical 
life, is the education furnished by the intellectual activity 
of the age. It will be observed that, valuable as all this 
is, it affords little instruction in the elements of natural 
science, and almost none at all in the practice or technics 
of industrial vocations. Its effect is one of general utility, 
and possesses as little for the physician or the lawyer as it 
does for the engineer, the artist, or the artisan. 

With regard to the public school, the same remark is 
almost applicable, for the system of education is there 
directed to acquirements of general utility. Its tendency 
and design are not only to train the intellect, but also to 
impart accomplishments which, in the main, are of a utili- 
tarian character, and such as can be turned to some account 
in the active business of life. The general effect has been 



OUR OBLIGATIONS TO THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 103 

to make the people intelligent, self-reliant, quick, and 
ready to learn the beneficent features of any useful pur- 
suit in which they engage. It renders them prompt to 
serve their country in official service, or on the field of 
battle. Our obligations to the public school are numer- 
ous and important ; much of the general intelligence 
which distinguishes the United States is traceable to its 
teachings ; it has given a fair start in life to thousands, 
and many of the most brilliant and accomplished men 
in the Union have been recruited from its walls. Its 
tendency is to elevate the character of our people, and in- 
sure the best interests of society. How infinitely impo- 
tent are the detractions of prejudice against these noble 
results! And yet there are drawbacks and defects that 
defy disproof ; for, while the useful arts of life have ex- 
ercised the most marked influence upon our position in 
the scale of civilization, and furnish employments for a 
very large portion of those who have to earn a living, the 
necessity of an education commensurate with these wants 
and relations has not been sufiiciently recognized in the 
programmes and routines of public instruction. 

How many, out of the numbers of young men who 
leave school, and who are gifted with every mental and 
physical requisite for success, and who are also splendidly 
disciplined by all the teachings of the public school, can 
gain assistance from their education in any practical pur- 
suit they intend to follow ? To be sure, they get along 
somehow, and many of them anyhow. The desire of 
reaching an honorable and useful condition is a stimulus, 
and in this country the field is broad and open to all, and 
those who are brave and ambitious come out with success, 
while others in the stern and aimless struggle have be- 



104 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

come dispirited and broken-liearted. The difficulty is 
being seriously considered, and many persons, well quali- 
fied to speak on the subject, do not hesitate to recommend 
the adoption of a course of manual training as a necessary 
and indispensable part of public education. And, from 
causes already adverted to, and still further to be dis- 
cussed, can it be doubted that the improvement would 
infinitely enhance the value of our school system, until it 
culminated into a perfection which would leave little to 
be desired ? 

It is said that this ought to be done in the workshop 
or in the manufactory ; but, let it be remembered that ap- 
prenticeship in mechanical trades has almost disappeared 
in this country, and well-trained workmen, among native- 
born Americans, are becoming scarcer every year. Cur- 
rent information states that manufacturers in artistic 
work are obliged to import foreign designers and work- 
men in the execution of highly finished productions; 
thus increasing the competition with our own artisans, 
and deteriorating the standard of wages for both. At the 
annual banquet of the Jewelers' Association in the city 
of ISTew York, in ]^ovember, 1880, one of the speakers 
made some remarks so pertinent on this subject, and com- 
ing from a practical man, that I can not do better than in- 
troduce them here. He said : 

"I hardly dare take up anymore of your time, but, if 
you will indulge me a moment longer, I would like to 
allude to one other subject. I mean the great and grow- 
ing need we have for the establishment of schools of art 
and design. The great need that we have all felt in our 
factories is cultured and artistic taste in our workmen. 
We need ai-tists as well as workmen. We need men not 



SPEECH ABOUT SCHOOLS OF ART AND DESIGN. 105 

only with strong arms and deft fingers, but active and 
fertile brains as well. We need schools where our young 
men and bojs can be early taught the use of the crayon 
and the pencil, and where they can learn the art of model- 
ing and designing, and be educated in everything that 
will tend to make them accomplished workmen and art- 
ists. This can only be done by making a commencement 
in our manufacturing towns and cities, in establishing 
schools of art and design. There are gentlemen here who 
employ four or five hundred men, boys, and girls. If, 
under the auspices of the large and flourishing establish- 
ments, and the smaller ones also, something could be 
done in the way I have imperfectly indicated, I think it 
would be a good beginning, and a step taken in the right 
direction. A short, familiar lecture of an evening, not 
only on designing and modeling, but on the nature of 
and the working in the precious metals, would greatly 
add to the interest of the occasion, and the instruction 
of the class would be a real pleasure and a substantial 
benefit, and, moreover, would bring together the employer 
and the employed in pleasant intercourse, and be a real 
bond of union between them. In some such way a com- 
mencement could be made, a class or school be formed 
which would be but the beginning of that large class and 
that large school which would one day bring skill and 
taste to our workmen, refinement and culture to our peo- 
ple, and honor and wealth to the nation." 

This is a clear statement of the case, by one who speaks 
from knowledge, and he shows the absolute necessity of 
art-education to the American artisan. There is scarcely 
an artistic trade that is not closed against him. We fre- 
quently read in the newspapers that the members of a 
6 



106 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

trades-union have stopped work for the reason that an 
apprentice has been employed after the full quota pre- 
scribed by their rules has been reached. Under such dis- 
advantages it is difficult to see how our native mechanics 
pick up their craft. Indeed, the mechanic arts are rapidly 
passing out of our hands. Our boys and girls are brought 
up intellectually, and without any taste for or idea of work. 
They seek other employment. Every year, throughout 
the land, great multitudes graduate from our schools ; 
and most of them are in a state of perplexity as to how 
they shall earn a living, and when the world opens its 
Pandora's box of evils before the young, we can only be 
comforted by the hope that the confusion will harmonize 
itself into the best results. They ask themselves, they ask 
their friends. What shall we do? They have received 
what would formerly have been considered almost a lib- 
eral education, and are not prone to consider the claims 
of agriculture and the various trades ; so they crowd into 
the large cities and towns, filling all the clerical employ- 
ments; some of the more resolute, facing the long and 
toilsome ascent of a regular calling, or the heroic endur- 
ance necessary to acquire a profession ; while still more of 
them join the ever-increasing flow into that great section 
of the community who are ready to accept an empty place 
on almost any terms. Here is an item of news, going the 
rounds, which illustrates the condition of thousands : " I 
am astonished," exclaimed a friend to a clerk, a really 
well-educated and accomplished person, "that you stand 
such bully-ragging from that ruffian." '* I think of my 
wife and babies," was the meek rejoinder ; " there would 
be fifty fellows after my place to-morrow." The man 
had made repeated attempts at suicide, as the strain of 



NEED OF PRACTICAL EDUCATION. 107 

the situation was too hard for him. The writer remarks : 
" Still they come, by reason of the delusion that the occu- 
pation is genteel, and that the labor of a mechanic or 
farmer, working with his own hands, is low. It will be a 
good thing for the community when such stuff and non- 
sense are knocked out of it." 

]S"ow, while our native-born workmen are slowly de- 
creasing in number, the artistic trades are multiplying 
prodigiously in our cities and manufacturing towns, with 
an ever-augmenting demand for industrial skill, with 
remunerative employment. The decorative arts, for in- 
stance, find the greatest encouragement in the United 
States, and the extent to which they may be carried is as 
absolutely boundless as human genius itself. The relish 
of our countrymen for the best of everything, and their 
taste for pleasure and display, give occupation to countless 
arts at home and abroad. Besides, as soon as any branch of 
science has discovered a principle which can be applied to 
the necessities or luxuries of life, it receives the utmost 
attention ; and if it stands the test of practical utility, it 
immediately receives encouragement in some appropriate 
department of human industry. The discovery that a 
magnet could be created by a galvanic current was long 
thought to be useless ; but it is now developed into the tele- 
graph. So of photography, by which light and electricity 
are made to exhibit the most beautiful and astonishing phe- 
nomena. The materials which produce the brightest and 
most durable colors are among the least abundant for 
the manufacture of vegetable dyes, and consequently the 
most costly ; but, by the application of aniline, the art of 
dyeing is not only brought to the highest perfection, but 
also a richness, brilliancy, and durability of coloring quite 



108 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

equal to that of the Gobelin tapestry of France is secured. 
And so of hundreds of examples of the same kind, which 
have incalculably enlarged the range of mechanical and 
artistic employments. These discoveries not only afford 
employments : but consider their utility — the car, the 
steamship, the compass ; think of the inappreciable com- 
forts these improvements afford the household of the 
humblest citizen. We have seen how they promote the 
agricultural interests, but every trade, calling, and occu- 
pation, every profession and interest, all classes in all 
seasons and at all times — the editor in his gazette, the 
author in his book, the artist at his easel, and the lawyer 
in his brief, are every one supplied in various ways by the 
skill and energy of those who labor in the countless utili- 
ties of modern discoveries and arts. 

Perhaps the most numerous class attending the public 
schools are the children of the poor or of those in mod- 
erate circumstances, and they are content, and are com- 
pelled to be content, with the minimum of mental educa- 
tion. Would not that education be greatly enhanced if it 
provided some manual exercise which would enable them 
to enter at once upon their intended trade or business 
with the greatest advantage ? Give them the tool, and a 
knowledge of its use, together with a general education, 
and it will be for them to do the rest. They will en- 
counter the inevitable inequalities of human intelligence, 
and if they are turned from the people's schools without 
any practical skill to aid them in the unequal combat, they 
can only count upon one half of their abilities, and can 
only put forth one half of their strength. An eclectic 
education would recognize the necessities of their condi- 
tion. 



EDUCATION SUGGESTED BY OUR STRUCTURE. IQQ 

The disinterested cultivation of the mind attracts the 
smallest number of those who study, while the great mass 
leave school as a necessity before finishing its courses. To 
develop their manual ability in gaining access to an indus- 
try or business will insure a durable and salutary means 
of support to countless thousands when they most need 
it. An attractive occupation, in which skill is allied to 
industry, yields not only the means of subsistence, but it 
stimulates the employed to frugality and diligence ; it 
imparts to them cheerfulness and contentment, and cher- 
ishes an elevated spirit of self-respect and independence. 
This is certainly one of the highest aims, if not the very 
highest, of a true education. Whatever makes better 
men and better citizens contributes to the general good 
and the public prosperity. 

It is said that education must be confined to intel- 
lectual culture, to the enlargement of the mind by the 
superimposition of information, and the communication 
of such rules and precepts as experience has developed 
and justified ; that, in fact, it consists in drawing forth 
the faculties, and molding them to certain elements of 
knowledge, which embrace in their generality the whole 
mental and moral adornment of mankind. The funda- 
mental error in this definition is, that it entirely overlooks 
our physical constitution. Even in the savage state of 
human existence they know better, for the parent guides 
his barbarous progeny to plunder and the chase. 

;Now, let us see what idea of education is suggested 
by our physical structure. The Psalmist declares that 
we are fearfully and wonderfully made. The complexity 
of our organization attracts the attention and admiration 
of both art and science. Whether we stand or walk, speak 



110 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

or hear, look or listen — in our external appearance, alone, 
we present to the observation a most wonderful phenom- 
enon. And not less so is the adaptation of our senses to 
the sensible qualities and elements with which we are sur- 
rounded. Could we penetrate the surface, and behold 
the nice articulations which give the hand its extraordi- 
nary strength and delicacy of touch — could we look into 
the attenuated channels which feed the eye with its heav- 
enly light — could a glimpse be afforded us of the almost 
spiritualized tissues of the lungs, from which flow the 
melodious accents of human speech — or, could we ascend 
with the crimson current into the brain, and behold Rea- 
son seated upon her throne, and see her hold intercourse 
through the mysterious labyrinth of the nervous system 
with the world around us, and taking note of the varied 
color, relation, and use of everything in matter, time, and 
space — then, indeed, should we be able to appreciate the 
association of all these in every human effort, and to ac- 
knowledge that each in its degree contributes to elevate 
and fortify the mind itself. And as the senses are as in- 
lets through which the images of things are carried to the 
intelligence, so they exert an influence not less important 
to the transcendent powers of the mind, by executing its 
ideas, motives, and perfections in the concrete forms of 
constructive art. Like a master who employs those pos- 
sessing special skill in his works, so the brain employs all 
the capacities of hand and eye, of touch and sound, to in- 
terpret its designs and thoughts into tangible forms — 
hence we have a machine, a vase, an article of furniture, 
a painting, or a ship. The mind conceives, the hand ex- 
ecutes; the two agencies bestow their ingenuity upon 
every object of value. They are distinct, but it would be 



EDUCATION SUGGESTED BY OUR STRUCTURE. m 

difficult, if not impossible, to tell wliere the idea of tlie 
one and tlie technic skill of the other could be separated. 
They co-operate intimately and indispensably, and the in- 
tellectual enjoyments we derive from the refinements of 
life are the harmonious results of their enduring labor. 
To convey the images of external things to the mental 
faculties, and to work out the thoughts thus created in 
the mind, is the mission of these organs ; and the marvel- 
ous precision with which they embody all mental concep- 
tions into forms of usefulness and beauty serve to excite 
the enthusiasm and admiration of mankind. The eyes 
and the hands are principally emj)loyed in these creations, 
and it is seen that just as they are perfected in their work 
can they translate the ideals of the mind and mingle with 
the intelligence of the spirit. By this means reflection 
and research are utilized into forms for the practical pur- 
poses of life, and the advancement of the race, and art, 
science, and philosophy embellish our existence. All this 
implies two kinds of education — lessons in regard to 
things, to our hands, and to our eyes, and furnishes proof 
that equality in education belongs to the generic relation 
of these parts with the mind itself, and is the true method 
to be pursued at the present time. This is the motto 
of industrial education — equality of mental and manual 
training, with due proportions in the order of teaching. 

It would be difficult to conjecture to what extent in- 
dustrial education can be carried. Many general plans 
have been suggested, and no doubt there have been, and 
there will continue to be, many doubtful experiments, 
but we know that schools and workshops have exercised 
the most marked influence upon the position of the Con- 
tinental countries of Europe. The standard system of 



112 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

education to-day in France, Germany, Austria, and Kussia, 
in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, in Belgium, Holland, 
and Switzerland, is an intimate incorporation of mental 
and manual training. Even among the people, the most 
distinguished by the singular ingenuity and address, if 
not superiority in their arts of life, this course is the most 
liberally and energetically sustained. It has recently been 
constituted a part of the public-school system established 
in France. The necessity of an education commensurate 
with the wants and relations of the age is inexorably de- 
manded by human pursuits. 

What, then, is the right and duty of the State in rela- 
tion to this matter ? The several States provide schools 
at the public expense in this country ; and primary and 
secondary instruction is universal and free to all — both 
sexes and every condition. The right of the State being 
admitted, the conclusions to be deduced are very simple : 

1. That the Government is created for the good of 
the people, and ought to provide every element of edu- 
cation necessary to their growth as a free and superior 
race. That the essential thing in education is to apply it 
to some useful purpose, having for its aim what is for the 
advantage of society and the development of the indi- 
vidual, and improving all the faculties of man, physical, 
intellectual, and moral, by studies appropriate to their 
unfold ment. It ought to develop the talents of the young 
and make them men and women of the age in which they 
live, so as to adapt their intelligence to the substantial 
transactions of life. 

2. As the sciences are now connected with every in- 
dustrial pursuit, the immense value of some knowledge 



DUTY OF THE GOVERNMENT. 113 

on these subjects is apparent, for upon them, as guides 
and instruments, must largely depend the future indus- 
try and happiness of the people. The application of the 
exact sciences to the processes of industry is a matter 
of the deepest interest to the inventor, the artisan, and 
the manufacturer. Education ought to be adapted to 
this state of society in order to prepare men and women 
for the active spheres of their future work. The time 
has, therefore, come when preparatory studies should be 
placed in the programmes of public instruction, especially 
to teach the natural laws which affect the different trades, 
together with exercise in hand-work, and the use of tools 
in general practice, in order to fit the young to master the 
special industry they intend to pursue. 

3. Whether the learning of trades is a proper part of 
public education is a problem which must be finally de- 
termined by the utilitarian struggle our lot in this country 
demands. The prejudices against it are relaxing, and we 
may be sure that whatever will bear the test of applica- 
tion, and the observation of a rigorous comparison, will 
ultimately be established by the gradual process of evo- 
lution. Since the decay of apprenticeship, the industrial 
school will originate in the necessities of our civilization ; 
for it will deal with that kind of study which bears most 
vitally upon the personal welfare of the industrial classes, 
and is equally necessary to maintain our superiority in the 
social and material activities of life. 

4. Passing from the vexed question of trades in the 
public schools, the art of drawing ought to be taught in 
them all, on account of its refining influence, as well as 
for the reason that it is the basis of all trades that depend 
upon design, and the students should be systematically 



114 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

instructed to work out the designs, and in the principles 
of perspective, and of color, light, and shadow ; also to 
prepare patterns for textile fabrics, ornamental carving 
in wood, and ornaments for glass, for pottery, for marble, 
for stone, and for embroidery. They should also acquire 
the practice of numerous arts which can be easily learned 
by those who can draw and the rudiments of practical 
industry, the use of tools, and a knowledge of a variety 
of substances connected with industrial art. This would 
afford a great amount of auxiliary knowledge in any in- 
dustrial career they might enter upon. 

The foregoing summary presents some of the points 
to be discussed in the following chapters. The claims of 
technological education, and its condition in this country, 
have already been referred to, and its scope and purpose 
have been exhibited as of the highest importance to all in- 
dustrial pursuits alike, especially where workshop practice 
has been introduced to teach the students the application of 
scientific theories to industrial purposes. We have also 
seen that institutions of this kind exist, or may exist, in 
each of the States by the bounty of Congress. But the 
great mass of the children can never reach them, and their 
only opportunity for acquiring any special knowledge 
preparatory to practical work must be taught them in 
tlie common schools. The workshops, which may be 
characterized as the last hope of our industrious youth, 
are closed against them, and apprenticeship exists only in 
name. If there is no industrial art in the ordinary school- 
lessons, their lot must be hard indeed. 

If it be true that studies should be pursued not only 
for their influence as an intellectual discipline, but also 



AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF INSTRUCTION. II5 

for their efficacy npon the pursuits and habits of the peo- 
ple, how can this degree of instruction be withheld, espe- 
cially since it also exerts a powerful influence in pro- 
ducing wealth, in checking evil, and promoting good? 
The State has clearly a right to look into and direct the 
particulars of an education which it freely bestows ; and 
it is the interest of the State that there be no illiterate 
minds, and that every child should be provided with the 
preparatory information connected with his future call- 
ing. The necessity for industrial education of some kind 
is so evident that the American Institute of Instruction, 
at its recent session in Saratoga (1882), appointed a com- 
mittee upon the subject, and John S. Clarke, of Boston, 
who was secretary of the committee, among other points, 
reported the following : 

4. Collaterally with this training of the senses, and 
this study of man, there should be proper training in the 
use of language for the purpose of receiving and express- 
ing thought abstractly; and also proper training of the 
hand in the use of tools for the purpose of expressing 
thought concretely. 

A foot-note expresses the meaning of the last clause 
to be: 

The tools here recommended are such hand and ma- 
chine tools as are used fundamentally in the manipulations 
of wood, stone, and metals — the hammer, saw, plane, chisel, 
gauge, square, file, lathe, planer, milling-machine, etc. 

A discussion ensued on the subject of industrial edu- 
cation in the public schools, which was characterized by 
great diversity of views, and a motion to lay the subject 
on the table was carried by a vote of sixty in the affirma- 



116 EDUCATION IN ITS KELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

tive to twenty in the negative. There is to be accorded 
to this body the highest rank among the educators in the 
United States, and, while the predominating feeling was 
unfavorable to any definite conclusion without further in- 
vestigation, it is to be regarded as a sign of progress that 
such a distinguished body of teachers should earnestly 
consider the subject, and impart their convictions to 
others. 

In matters of education the empire of habit is singu- 
larly powerful, and innovations can only be accomplished 
by steady and persistent effort. Industrial education is 
the imperious demand of the times, and yet able and 
learned men will find themselves in unfriendly relations 
with the necessary reforms. We can remember how diffi- 
cult it was to impress the principles of the equality of 
science with the classics upon our colleges. The cause of 
science has, however, been substantially gained, and the 
universities are now vying with each other in offering 
facilities for scientific studies. 

The future is before us, and the cause of education 
can but be benefited by the agitation. 



CHAPTEE YII. 

The art of drawing — ^Natural order of studies begins with it — The lesson of 
things — Effect of, on industrial education — Indispensable in education 
— Massachusetts and New York — Branch of primary education in — 
Prejudice against it — Practical use of drawing — Exhibit at Centen- 
nial — French commission at — Experience at Taunton — "Women's Art 
School, Cooper Union — Walter Smith's system — Drawing ought to be 
directed to the industries — Beauty of outline — It is teaching every 
trade that depends upon design — Involves easy lessons in geometry, 
botany, architecture, and history — Geometrical drawing first — Orna- 
ment — Its almost universal appUcation in the olden time — Then came 
utility alone — The working artist — Improvement of public taste — Effect 
upon our industries — Mr. Outis's work — Drawing in France — French 
styles — Expenditures for teaching it — The reason of her beautiful 
works— Great Britain — Her expenditure to promote the art of drawing 
— Drawing as a branch of study in this country — Common schools — 
The importance of drawing to various industries — ^Architecture in New 
York — Importation of workmen for building. 

Theke is one study which lies at the basis of all the 
constructive arts, and which has been made a branch of 
priraarj education to the children of the poor as well as 
of the rich in all the systems of public instruction in 
Europe. I refer to the study of the art of drawing. Its 
importance as a branch of industrial education will justify 
the space devoted to its consideration. 

This art was formerly valued only in its relation to 
the tine arts. But now the useful can no longer exist 



118 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. ' 

apart from the beautiful, and consequently there are few 
industries in which drawing can be dispensed with. We 
have already insisted that the notions of things come to 
the mind through the senses, and, as our knowledge com- 
mences with sensible objects, so the natural order of 
studies commences with their reproduction. It improves 
both mind and body, for the eyes become accustomed to 
seize with rapture the lineaments of ^Nature, and not only 
the color and outlines, but the properties of objects before 
us, whether we are walking, or eating, or working. In 
fact, drawing is the lesson of things which constitute 
nearly the whole action of human experience. 

If the sight of an object pleases a child, what better 
exercise can he have than to copy it ? He learns the re- 
lations of real things, not by didactic teaching which he 
cannot understand, but intuitively. The exercise not 
only educates the hand and eye, and in a higher degree 
the judgment also, but it excites his curiosity, and he is 
led to draw his own conclusions, which stimulates his de- 
sire for knowledge. It is following the rational method 
of beginning at the beginning. This is why drawing 
should be placed among the early lessons, and should 
never lose its place at the head of the programmes. 
When the art of drawing shall be permanently established 
in all the public schools, the cause of industrial educa- 
tion will be nearly accomplished, and its place marked in 
the new order of studies. 

Massachusetts gave the key-note of industrial edu- 
cation in the United States by introducing teaching in 
drawing as one of the several branches of instruction in 
her common schools, an example which New York fol- 
lowed soon afterward. It is now generally recognized as 



DRAWING. llQ 

the only foundation upon which the useful and decorative 
arts can be successfully sustained, or upon which they can 
advance to constantly increasing perfection in form and 
beauty. From being merely an ornamental accomplish- 
ment, it is now in fact regarded as an indispensable ele- 
ment in all industrial education ; and an opinion deduced 
from experience prevails that all progress in the produc- 
tive arts not only requires but inexorably demands the 
most comprehensive and accurate knowledge in the de- 
signs and models which drawing alone can furnish. A 
paragraph has been going the rounds of the newspapers 
denouncing the teaching of drawing in our public 
schools, as " educational filigree." I am tempted to give 
a passage, as furnishing a specimen of the criticism to 
which this study is sometimes subjected. The writer 



The frantic enthusiasm about drawing which animated 
school boards and superintendents several years ago is 
getting cooler and cooler ; in many places the number of 
drawing-teachers has been reduced, and a pitiful effort is 
made to train the regular teachers to the work. This 
enthusiasm, unfortunately, has cost a great deal of money, 
and the chief practical result has been that a number of 
stiff drawings were exhibited at the Centennial celebra- 
tion at Philadelphia. Whatever good in the way of handi- 
work this study in our schools has accomplished, could 
have been brought about in a wiser way. The " training 
of the eye " and " cultivation of the tastes," so much talked 
about by some of the people who make their living by 
teaching drawing in these public schools, have, in all truth 
and sadness, never yet been discerned. To use the lan- 
guage of common sense, this is trash. The training to 
read with intelligence and appreciative understanding one 
famous masterpiece of the English language would be 



120 EDUCATION IN ITS KELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

worth in way of cultivation a thousand of these drawing- 
lessons. 

Possibly one pupil in five hundred has some impulse 
given to his hand in drawing which may make him in 
after-life a better mechanic. The other four hundred and 
ninety-nine have meanwhile acquired no deftness which 
will assist them on the farm, in the counting-room, or 
in the kitchen. Why should all these be wrongly busied 
for the sake of one ? 

Of course, it may be the fact that drawing is not 
taught properly in some of our public schools. It is not 
unlikely that it is in many instances badly taught, because 
it is comparatively a new study, and there are so few that 
are yet qualified to give instruction. But is it not most 
unreasonable to argue that it ought not to be taught at 
all, since it is indisputable that, wherever drawing is 
taught on intelligent principles, it is the certain means of 
progress in all the useful arts of life ? The question 
whether the pupils in our public schools should be in- 
structed in drawing might be easily settled if the dispu- 
tants would calmly consider that the greatest number of 
the children are to be the workmen of the future, and 
that the methods of teaching them should be shaped in 
accordance to their destiny. 'No one can doubt but that 
a knowledge of drawing will be an essential aid to every 
class of handicraftsmen, for it is the absolute friend of 
every art. Its predominance is visible in every article 
fabricated by the hands or ingenuity of man. 

The mistake of the writer consists in supposing that 
the duty of the teacher of drawing in an elementary school 
is to turn out artists. Kow, that is just what is not 
attempted, and what ought not to be expected. The 



DRAWING. 121 

practical use of drawing to the pupil is, that it enables 
him not merely to make but to understand a sketch or 
plan in the line of his trade. He can give a pictorial 
presentation of a machine, a building, a bronze, or an 
invention, and he can work from it without instruction 
or blundering, without waste of time or material, and 
carry out the design with taste and beauty. Here is a 
striking illustration furnished by W. W. Waterman, Su- 
perintendent of Schools at Taunton, Massachusetts. He 
writes that — 

Since the introduction of drawing as one of the regu- 
lar studies in the public schools of Taunton, some ten 
years ago, and the maintenance of an evening drawing- 
school during the entire season, a very decided improve- 
ment has been observed in the qualification of youth who 
leave the schools to engage in the industries of the city. 
The superintendents of our machine-shops and other 
mechanical establishments report that formerly great dif- 
ficulty was experienced in teaching apprentices to read 
plans, and to understand the principles involved in their 
work. 

But now those who have been educated in our schools 
generally read plans quite intelligently, become better 
artisans, and produce a greatly improved quality of work. 

The superintendent of one of the leading locomotive- 
works says that he finds the services of the young men 
who enter his establishment from our schools to be worth 
twenty-five per cent more than formerly. Before the 
systematic study of drawing became a part of our school 
course, skilled labor was, from necessity, brought largely 
from Europe. I^ow it is supplied mainly from home 
talent. 

Similar testimony is afforded by the experience of 
Miss Powers, teacher of drawing in the Woman's Art 



122 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

School, Cooper Union. She declares that in the course 
of five years she has abundant proof of the practical value 
of the instruction. That the designing departments of 
the artistic trades in 'New York, and even tlie architects, 
have her pupils in their employment ; and that entire 
satisfaction has been experienced by all the employers at 
the work they have done ; and that one of them was 
especially cordial in his appreciation of the details of the 
class training in the study of ornament, regarding it as 
unique, and such as many professional draughtsmen stood 
greatly in need of. Some of the girls are china-painters, 
some make designs for lace and embroidery, and in some 
cases actually do the work. Some are carpet-designers, 
and many are teaching drawing in all parts of the country. 
If such are the results in the comparatively short time, in 
a practical point of view, since the introduction of this 
study into the education of a few only of our schools, we 
cannot doubt but they will stimulate others by their 
example, until drawing shall become as indispensable a 
branch of general education as writing itself. 

A noticeable feature in the passage already referred 
to is the discouraging sneer at the drawings of our 
schools exhibited at the Centennial celebration at Phila- 
delphia. It is quite popular among some to disparage all 
attempts at art by our countrymen. In this instance the 
writer in question has stepped aside to cast a slur upon 
the specimens of an art which is destined to play so great 
a part in the industrial history of the United States. 
The French Educational Commissioners to the Centennial 
expressed a very high degree of appreciation of the draw- 
ings sent by our schools for exhibition. Professor Walter 
Smith's system of teaching drawing in the public schools 



DRAWING. 123 

of Massachusetts had been introduced only two years be- 
fore, and, owing to the superior merits of his mode of in- 
struction, these schools had taken the foremost rank, and 
soon afterward became the models for all others. Upon 
this exhibition, the French commissioners remark that 
the public schools of Massachusetts presented a collective 
exhibit extremely remarkable, the most complete of all, 
and the most methodically arranged ; and that, such as 
these works arcj they bear witness to the excellence of 
the method, to the good disposition of the scholars, as 
well as to the conscientious and intelligent care given to 
the instruction, with the view of developing the practice 
of practical elementary drawing. " If we bear in mind," 
they add, " that these fruits are the results of a few years 
of trial, we must admit that never before have such re- 
markable results in so short a time been attained." We 
know something of the French character ; we also know 
that no other people have given so much attention to the 
art of drawing for two hundred years ; and we know how 
it has influenced the industry, the refinement, and the 
power of their nation. It is unnecessary to suspect exag- 
geration in their encomium. We may receive the ad- 
miration of these men with enthusiasm, for it is the im- 
partial record of their supreme refinement and perfected 
judgment, which we are at liberty to set oS against the 
sample of popular prejudice referred to, but which is fast 
dying out. 

So far as our public schools are concerned, instruction 
in drawing, under existing circumstances, ought to be 
directed to the useful aims of life — to teach children as 
much as will enable them to represent, in free outline, 
the solid forms of those objects with which, or on which, 



124 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

tliej will probably work. In whatever department of 
industry the turn of mind or necessities of the artisan 
may lead him to practice, a knowledge of pure form in 
drawing: will be the basis of real excellence and success. 
Every article may be made beautiful as well as useful, 
and the chief attribute of this combination is embraced 
in the correctness of forms ; and the utmost pains on the 
part of the teacher, and assiduity on the part of the pupil, 
should be exercised, in order to acquire accuracy and beau- 
ty of outline. It matters little how elaborately a bronze 
or a vase may be finished and decorated, for, when the 
form is ungraceful, all is thrown away. Indeed, fine fin- 
ish and elaborate ornamentation are worse than thrown 
away upon an ugly form ; for such are the growing de- 
mands of taste that articles can only be made beautiful, 
and therefore salable, if they conform to the simple 
rules of drawing. This is almost equally true of every 
pursuit, whether it is that of a carpenter, a machinist, a 
shoemaker, a designer, or a tinsmith : greater excellence 
will be acquired when the artisan labors with the eye and 
hand, skilled and trained in its practice. It is not a mat- 
ter of learning only an art, but of teaching, in a great 
measure, every trade that depends upon design. The 
study requires time and patience to acquire it, notwith- 
standing that the elements of drawing are extremely 
simple. A perpendicular, a horizontal, and a curve — 
these constitute the elements of the art. A school-boy can 
be taught to translate a Latin verse into English by dint 
of years of study ; but he can be taught with greater ease 
and in much less time how, by the use of these sim- 
ple lines, he can translate a solid cube to a flat surface, 
preserving its appearance to the eye by isometrical repre- 



DRAWING. 125 

sentations ; and by a little ingenuity still further changing 
it into a rectangle, a desk, or a foolstool. Thus, a knowl- 
edge of elementary geometry is unconsciously conveyed 
to the intelligence without any strain upon the youthful 
memory, and the reflections naturally excited by the expe- 
rience are very often utilized, if the pupil is bright, into 
useful forms for the practical purposes of life. 

When the lesson requires the pupil to draw a leaf or 
flower, he goes among the herbs, he takes the flowers in 
his hands, and becomes familiar with their form, struct- 
ure, the arrangement of their parts, the midrib, stems, 
and veins of plants. These attract and fascinate his at- 
tention, and afford amusing and easy lessons in botany. 
When he learns to conventionalize them, he receives 
further insight into the analysis of plant-life, which en- 
hances his taste for natural science. And in the same 
unconscious manner he acquires a knowledge, while prac- 
tising the art of drawing, of arithmetic, architecture, me- 
chanics, engineering, and anatomy, and he has the pleas- 
ure of feeling that he learns them almost alone. 

When an historical design is placed before liim to de- 
lineate, he becomes familiar with the facts relating to the 
character of the nations who, though dead, continue to 
delight and instruct mankind by the magnificence and 
splendor of their arts. Thus do these simple lines, un- 
consciously to the scholar himself, promote his knowl- 
edge, facilitate his learning, elevate his sentiments, and 
qualify him for honest work and material prosperity. 
Instruction in this study should be specially adapted to 
the necessities of industrial art. The principles of geo- 
metrical design are prominently apparent in all the forms 
of labor where construction is employed, as well as in 



126 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

grading cities, planting colonies, in mining, and anatomy. 
The characteristics of the lines and curves in geometric 
drawing, and the instruments used in their arrange- 
ment and proportion, are essential things, so far as a 
knowledge of form is considered, and should therefore 
be carefully practiced in every system of teaching. Per- 
spective groupings and the various forms of projections 
are topics which may properly be postponed until the 
principles involved in the geometrical representation of 
objects on flat surfaces or in solid forms have been suc- 
cessfully mastered. 

But corresponding almost in importance with form is 
the subject of decoration. Owing to the peculiarities of 
our taste, which require ornament to constitute one of the 
principal features of art-work, a critical knowledge of its 
principles is a necessary preparation for every man who 
intends to work at a trade. Matters of proportion, con- 
struction, and outline, exist independently of extrinsic 
ornamentation ; but all must acknowlege that, when these 
qualities are associated with decorative effect in the same 
production, it commands in a much higher degree our 
admiration, and the eye of the skilled workman who cre- 
ated it or of the connoisseur contemplates it with pride 
and emotion. The advantage of an acquaintance with 
the principles of designing ornamental figures, and of 
skill in the beautiful delineation of the examples in an- 
cient and modern art, will be very manifest, when we 
consider that they are applied to all sorts of textile fab- 
rics, to all covering surfaces, such as wall-paper, carpets, 
etc., and to the various productions in wood, metal, me- 
chanics, and architecture. The different styles that have 
descended from Egyptian, Greek, Roman, and Gothic 



DRAWING. 127 

art, will be a pleasing and instructive study, carrying 
the mind back to those great nations who have passed 
away, and who now only live in the grandeur and dura- 
bility of their works. The general rules which govern 
the arrangement and proportion in the lessons of de- 
sign are simple and can be acquired by every school boy 
or girl possessing a mediocrity of intelligence ; while 
in original designing there will be ample scope for rich 
and picturesque combinations when the pupils are gifted 
with feeling and imagination. 

Great excellence in the art of decorative design was 
attained hundreds of years ago ; and the specimens which 
have survived are extremely valuable, since many of the 
art-industries which produced them have either deterio- 
rated or been entirely forgotten. In those days the artist 
was also a worker, and the artisan was frequently a painter, 
an architect, or a sculptor. Stones and pebbles, furniture 
and glass, gold and silver, were so beautifully embellished 
as to compel the admiration of succeeding ages. An in- 
terval supervened during which utility alone was con- 
sidered as proper in useful things ; but within the last few 
years the application of art to industry has been revived, 
and a display of the beautiful is again united with the 
useful, and a great improvement is visible in our build- 
ings, our manufactures, and in the multiplication of ar- 
tistic employments. The laboring artist has reappeared, 
and his condition is marked by an air of refinement and 
the general superiority of his surroundings. Many of 
them receive very large remuneration. Designing is ris- 
ing into the dignity of a profession, and many branches 
of ornamental work are held to be suitable occupations 
for women. Carpets and wall-paper with beautiful pat- 



128 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

tern designs, colored glass, fresco-painting, bronze-work, 
pottery, artistic furniture, wood-carving, and the infusion 
of dye-stuffs, are rapidly spreading among the industrial 
arts of America. The movement has become so general 
as to be the fashion. The evidence is abundant that it is 
also a genuine feeling, and that the public taste is really 
improving ; and it is just to say that the drawing-lessons 
of the last few years have exercised a great influence upon 
our industries, and have served to promote the giant strides 
of our manufactories. 

The education of so many children in the true prin- 
ciples of taste is gradually infusing a sense of refine- 
ment, and creating not only a class of skilled workers, 
but is also preparing still greater numbers to appreciate 
and purchase their productions. 

Indeed, the teaching of free-hand drawing to the chil- 
dren of the United States, and of geometrical and per- 
spective drawing to thousands in the more advanced classes 
as a regular branch of instruction in our public schools, 
is a subject of equal importance to us as a manufacturing 
people with that of writing itself. 

An English author published a book in 1869 upon the 
" Yoid in Modern Education." * The dignity of the sub- 
ject and the extraordinary merits of the work exact pro- 
found consideration. It contains many striking observa- 
tions concerning the deficiencies in the present systems 
of education, particularly in regard to the art of drawing, 
which more than any other study is calculated to awaken 
the feelings and the sentiments, while at the same time it 
is incomparably the best means of expressing form, being 
greatly superior to language for this purpose; and he 

* Outis. 



DRAWING. 129 

urges that more convincing evidence of knowledge can be 
obtained on all matters conversant with form by means of 
a few strokes of the pencil than by an hour's verbal ex- 
amination. He admits that it may be inferior to model- 
ing where solidity is concerned, yet it is greatly superior 
in point of rapid execution and a facility for exhibiting 
the relation of parts, which, often underlying one another, 
can only be shown by the dotted or faint lines of the cray- 
ons ; and in speaking of the practical uses of drawing he 
observes that — 

It would be idle to follow in detail all those voca- 
tions wherein drawing is equally or even more important : 
as in civil and military engineering, for instance, where it 
is simply indispensable ; in scientific voyages of discovery, 
where it is equally so; in all branches of natural history, 
where it is in special demand ; in manufacturing estab- 
lishments, where it is variously employed both in designs 
for textile fabrics and for patterns of all kinds ; in up- 
holstery, cabinet-making, cutlery, and for the various and 
all but infinite requirements of the silversmith, watch- 
maker, jeweler, and the maker of musical, astronomical, 
surgical, and mathematical instruments ; not to mention 
its value to the potter, the turner, the decorator, the mason, 
the carver, the frame-maker, and alaiost every manufact- 
uring tradesman. 

As far back as the time of Charlemagne, France 
founded schools for teaching drawing to her children; 
and, before the period of the Renaissance, schools existed 
in Paris, Normandy, Burgundy, Breton, and at various 
points in the south, so that she was better prepared to 
understand and adopt the new movement, which she 
soon developed into the most magnificent compositions in 
decorative art. From the reign of Francis I, different 



130 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

styles followed each other, distinguished by the names 
of her kings, who reigned successively until the monarchy 
was abolished. During each epoch generations of artists 
were educated, and France became the school to which 
those of other nations resorted for improvement. As late 
as the year 1880 the municipal authorities of Paris con- 
tributed to their primary schools nearly $2,000,000 per 
annum for instruction in drawing alone, in addition to 
about $100,000 for the support of art night-classes. And 
the state gave upward of $20,000,000 to promote the 
same study in the state schools, where free instruction is 
given to all comers. 

Although the French styles of ornament and form 
have been subjected to much criticism, it is undeniable 
that the French ornamentists became skillful in beautiful 
figures, in coloring and in innumerable designs on glass 
and canvas, and on woven textures, in painting, engrav- 
ing, in locksmith and goldsmith work, in pottery, in cabi- 
net furniture and bronze, in all of which the science of 
beauty and skill was so clearly revealed that she has been 
justly regarded as the modern founder of " art-industry." 
Hence, also, her beautiful pictures, and her wonderful de- 
velopment of art in every branch of manufactures and 
industry. She not only supplies us with countless articles 
of luxury and enjoyment, which we do not so well pro- 
duce, for want of her educated skill, but in nine cases 
out of ten it will be found that, in many of our home 
trades and manufactures which depend upon art or finish, 
her artisans have been imported into this country to fill 
the leading positions, and her designs and patterns are 
either taken bodily or slavishly imitated. Her marvelous 
wealth springs largely from the superiority of her fabrics ; 



DRAWING. 131 

and the spirit of beauty which adorns them is the natural 
result of art-education in her workmen. 

Great Britain within the last thirty years has included 
teaching drawing in her public schools, or rather in those 
which receive assistance from the Government, and in ad- 
dition there are thousands of evening-classes for the in- 
struction of those who cannot attend in the day-time; 
and the number of pupils has gone on increasing from 
year to year, until in 1879 there were no less than 59,500 
students in the science and art schools, and 795,000 in the 
elementary schools, receiving instruction in drawing, at 
a cost to the state of $658,600. It will be seen that the 
amount expended in Great Britain is insignificant in 
comparison with what is spent in France for the same 
objects. But it is apparent in both countries, and indeed 
all over the Continent, that the onward progress of art as 
applied to industry depends largely upon the interest 
which government takes in its promotion, and that the 
cultivation of art and technical education will advance 
the social well-being of the people at large ; and that, the 
more thoroughly educated they are, the more rapidly they 
will excel in all that is essential to the general prosperity. 

In Massachusetts, ^ew York, and many other places 
in this country, lessons in drawing are brought within the 
reach of every child of the community ; and evening- 
classes are also opened in some of the large towns for the 
instruction of all who may come. Right here in "Wash- 
ington, drawing is taught in the public schools, not as a 
speciality, but in the regular course of study. Drawings 
by the pupils have been exhibited for two years annually 
(1882) for public inspection ; and the fact that such ex- 
hibitions are visited by thousands of the citizens not only 



132 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

displays how general is the interest, but inspires the hope 
that this art with its refining and commanding influence 
is gradually assuming its true position in the ordinary 
course of common school education. It is absolutely ne- 
cessary that all the business and industrial classes should 
understand this practical art in the utilitarian struggle of 
this age and country. All the callings and pursuits that 
are brought into competition with each other stand ready 
to appropriate every revelation of art or science that can 
promote their interest. Science is no longer speculative, 
and art is no longer confined to mere artistic effect. 
They are applied to all the industries of society : and 
the competition is so keen that he who knows best how 
to apply them to the processes of production is sure of 
success. The inventor, the artificer, the workman, and 
the manufacturer are all interested in a study that so 
deeply concerns their several pursuits. Architecture, 
bridge-making, every species of machinery and internal 
improvement ; every instrument associated with our labor 
or convenience ; our china and earthenware ; the fabrics 
which are so delicate in texture, so brilliant and harmo- 
nious in color, and so striking in general elegance of style, 
as well as the articles in the parlor, the kitchen, the pan- 
try, and indeed all the improvements in modern life serve 
to illustrate the principles of design, and are manufac- 
tured and fashioned from geometrical patterns and out- 
line representations, which were prepared in the first in- 
stance by the draughtsman ; and, unless these objects had 
been symmetrically drawn before they were made, they 
would never have existed, except in clumsy forms, and 
perhaps so illy constructed that many of them would 
have been dangerous to the public. 



APPLICATION OF DRAWING. 133 

The art of drawing is used in many cases where its 
employment is little suspected. Look at a lady in full 
dress, and consider by what rules her bonnet was plaited, 
her laces were woven, her stockings were knitted, her 
comb was ornamented, her ribbons were flowered, her 
buttons were molded, her necklaces and bracelets were 
fashioned, her shoes and even the rosettes on her instep 
were executed ; and the answer will be that they were 
all devised by designs in drawing, and not a single feat- 
ure of this lovely assemblage was left to chance or acci- 
dent. 

The building of the poor man's cottage is according 
to plans and specifications. Its boards, beams, roof, and 
floors are sawed, tongued, and matched to fit each other 
according to the draughts, as are also the doors and win- 
dows of the humble dwelling. The manufacturers of the 
simplest instruments — like the hoe, the spade, the rake, 
the pickaxe, the scythe, the sickle, the reaper, chairs, and 
bedsteads — all have draughting-ofiices connected with their 
establishments. The machinist who makes the shears 
with which the shepherd clips the flock, and the ma- 
chinery which cards, and spins, and weaves, the fleece 
into cloth, is dependent upon his practical designs. The 
mason cuts the stone upon which he bestows such pro- 
digious labor by the same rules. The beautiful work be- 
stowed upon the granite blocks in the Government edi- 
fices at Washington, and by which they are made to fit 
into their places in those magnificent structures like 
sculptured figures into their niches, although transported 
hundreds of miles, are prepared by the same means. 

We learn from the newspapers that never before were 
such costly structures in course of erection in New York 



134: EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. J 

1 
(1882). It has been stated that buildings were construct- \ 
ed last year in that city at a cost of nearly $100,000,000, ' 
and that the furnishing and decorations would amount j 
to as much more. Instances are stated of $60,000 having i 
been expended in decorating a single apartment. The 
taste of her millionaires is expressed in ornamentation of ; 
their dwellings outside as well as inside, and workmen 
are brought over from Europe to carve the stone traceries I 
and figures on their house-fronts. Every figure mnst be j 
cut by an imported artisan, and, of course, the delay and 
expense are enormous. One of the wealthy citizens is i 
erecting three buildings of this description, and the orna- 
mental work has to wait till these artists from Europe are 
ready to do it. Four other elegant mansions are also 
mentioned, one of which will have a single imported • 
chimney-piece that cost $4,800, made of wood — which is ; 
not a scarce article in this wooden country — and a foreign | 
sculptor vnll design the artistic details of the entrances. j 
It is useless to find fault with affluent gentlemen be- \ 
cause they insist upon having the best. They are able \ 
and willing to pay for it. Besides, it is natural for i 
wealth and travel to produce refinement, and, where re- 
finement exists, it is more or less the companion of fastid- 
iousness. It is, moreover, far better for them to spend ; 
their money in giving employment to others than to give \ 
it away. We should also bear in mind that fine speci- 
mens of architecture are among the noblest works of ] 
human genius, and symbolize the collective art, science, j 
and wisdom of the people. The aboriginal Greek, who \ 
lived in a hovel, had no foreknowledge of the Athenian 
Acropolis ; and perhaps nothing gives us a finer idea of 
that antique grandeur than its monuments. A temple of 



APPLICATION OF DRAWING. 135 

Phidias gives us as sensible an image of Greek character 
as an ode of Pindar. If the buildings which have in- 
vited these remarks will present an arrangement and 
style illustrating the elements of taste as applied to archi- 
tecture and the particular ideas of modern life and re- 
quirements in our dwellings and public edifices, they will 
serve as models for the opulent, and will stimulate the 
sentiments and ambition of our architects, builders, me- 
chanics, and decorators, and so hasten the movement now 
commenced for art-education as applied to the current 
facts of our condition. 



CHAPTER YIIL 

The decorative arts depend upon principles of design — Their position 
between the useful and scientific— Their immense development — Ro- 
man and Greek decoration — Pompeii — Its uncovered ornaments — 
Moorish decoration — Its magnificence and extent — Table-service for 
the President — Glass-blowers sent to the United States — Immigration — 
Skilled occupations of immigrants — The economic value of immigrants 
— Influx of cheap labor — Exclusion of Chinese — William A. Carsey — 
An American mechanic on the tariff, cheap labor, etc. — Cheap labor 
from abroad — Trades-unions limiting the number of apprentices — 
Growth of our productive force, and of our population — Skilled labor 
enriches our industries — " Sheffield is coming to America " — American 
steel exhibit — American porcelain — Palissy — Wedgwood — Glad- 
stone's speech — Wedgwood's improvements — Ilis beautiful produc- 
tions — Palissy— Enameled pottery rediscovered by him — Our work in 
pottery — Our styles and workers obtained from abroad — Centennial 
vase — New branch of industry — Every potter should be a draughtsman 
— Drawing as a study — Colored patterns for cotton and woolen fab- 
rics — The use of machinery in printing — Chemistry in that art — Value 
of drawing in it — It yields the grand secret of modern industry — 
Universal practice of drawing in skilled work — Should be taught to 
all — The beautiful is overlooked — It is a universal element in nature. 

It is almost impossible to conceive how many employ- 
ments accompany a refined condition of the decorative 
arts. The number of pursuits which they have furnished 
to skilled labor during recent years have been so great 
that it is difficult to classify them, or to observe any sys- 
tematic plan in arranging them ; but it is still true that 



DECORATIVE ART AT POMPEII. 137 

they all depend upon a knowledge of drawing and the 
principles of design. The position of these arts is pecul- 
iar, for it must be confessed that they are not ranked as 
purely useful, or as strictly scientific, but rather they di- 
vide the ground between these two, and are closely con- 
nected with both. These considerations are of growing 
interest to the intelligent artisan and the far-seeing friend 
of industrial education, for their development in our day 
is simply immense. And here a little detail becomes ne- 
cessary, and the continuity of the argument will occa- 
sionally be slightly interrupted by illustrations showing 
the use of drawing and design in the arts and manufact- 
ures, but it will still be drawing, for design is the very 
soul of art-industry and the perfection of its work. 

The character and form of Greek and Roman deco- 
ration are illustrated by the rich colorings and beautiful 
vignettes of Pompeii, that have not lost their luster in all 
these centuries. ]N^ot only mosaics and frescoes embel- 
lish the facings of the uncovered dwellings, but the trav- 
eler observes bright pictures of birds, and beasts, and 
fishes, together with hunting-scenes of the liveliest kind, 
horses in full chase, wild-fowl and game in the range of 
a perspective of rocks, rivers, woods, and green hills, 
upon the walls of a dining-room. In other apartments 
are seen picturesque and striking ornamental work in 
great variety, elaborate mosaics and paintings representing 
figures of animals, scenes from every-day life, and the 
forms of gods and goddesses, rendered still more effective 
by the freshness of the overhanging skies and clouds. The 
marble steps and fountains in the court-yards appear very 
wonderful, even to those most familiar with such objects. 
The works of their hands testify how well the Pompeiian 



138 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

artisans could use the coloring substances with which 
they were acquainted, and elaborate the most beautiful 
designs as a matter of ordinary skill and taste. Besides 
these, there are hundreds of objects gathered in the mu- 
seums upon which art has been employed to ornament 
them and give a pleasing effect to the eye ; perpetuating 
a representation of the domestic characteristics of the 
Pompeiians, and of the great extent and variety of their 
industry, their luxury, and their workmanship. Says a 
recent tourist, *' I should like to spend a week at Pom- 
peii every year, if only to watch the uncovering and revel 
in the new findings." The graceful outlines and mathe- 
matical precision show how much care the Pompeiian 
designer bestowed upon his work. 

The wealth and splendor of the Moorish cities in Spain 
would be incredible were not the facts corroborated by 
historians whose truthfulness has never been questioned. 
A French author, whose book has been charmingly trans- 
lated into our own language by an American lady, assures 
us that the Moorish provinces at the time of Abderrahman 
were extremely populous ; that there existed on the shores 
of the Guadalquivir twelve thousand villages, and that a 
traveler could not proceed through the country without 
encountering some hamlet every quarter of an hour ; that 
there existed in the dominions of that caliph eighty great 
cities, three hundred of the second order, and an infinite 
number of smaller towns ; that Cordova, the capital of 
the kingdom, inclosed within its walls two hundred thou- 
sand houses and nin*e hundred public baths. 

These vast cities must have been the homes of indus- 
try and the asylums of useful and decorative art; and 
their magnificence must have furnished constant employ- 



MORISCO ART. 139 

ment to multitudes of cuiming workers. The Koran 
prohibited any pictorial representation of human beings 
or animals ; and this interdict modified to a great extent 
the superficial expression of Morisco art, of which a great 
many beautiful descriptions have been written bj "Wash- 
ington Irving. Here were seen in endless variety the 
diagonal arabesques filled with foliage, and stalks, and 
flowers. Here also was invented, or at least perfected, 
the fine stucco-work for use upon walls and divided into 
panels, or modeled into fanciful shapes, with ornaments 
cut into the material, or sculptured into bas-reliefs by 
hand upon the surface. Here, also, were first used the 
tile-casings for a great variety of ornamental purposes ; 
frette-work much more elaborate than that of the Greeks 
and the trefoil of the Egyptians, to give increasing rich- 
ness to their arabesques. The buildings were rendered 
still more beautiful by marble pavements, and light and 
graceful columns, richly gilded; and exquisite geomet- 
rical designs in brilliant and enduring colors ; open fili- 
gree-work shining upon arches white with marble, and 
penciled with inlays that are still admired by artists of 
every kind. Indeed, when reading Mr. Irving's descrip- 
tion, you feel as if you had before you a scene of en- 
chantment. 

We have little information what the condition of the 
skilled workmen was in that country or in Pompeii ; but, 
from the technical and manipulative skill displayed in 
their effects, it is evident that they were well trained in 
the theory and practice of design. It is also evident, from 
the multiplicity and magnificence of their works, that 
they must have been a very numerous and powerful part 
of the people ; and we are justified in assuming that their 



140 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

condition corresponded in some degree to the superiority 
of their education and refinement. The author cannot 
enter into the particulars of their fonn and style of orna- 
ment. The characteristics of both are familiar to the 
professional student, and they are here referred to for the 
purpose of showing that art-industry when founded upon 
design is unlimited, that its treasures are endless, and 
that its augmentations to human pursuits will never cease. 

But to return to our own condition. An instance of 
our want of educated workers is strikingly exemplified 
in the porcelain table-service for the President to be used 
in the White House. About fi.ve or six years ago the at- 
tention of the whole country was called to this extraordi- 
nary achievement of American art. It was ordered of the 
Havilands, of New York, and they engaged Mr. Davis, of 
the same place, to prepare the drawings. The porcelain 
was nevertheless made at their famous pottery in Limoges, 
France, and the French china-painters used the drawings 
after the style in which they are accustomed to do their 
own work ; and all the persons engaged on the job were 
Frenchmen, except Mr. Davis, who is English by birth. 
Let us not pretend to criticise this table-service ; but the 
arrangement lately suggested to lock it up is entitled to 
respect. At all events, it cannot be exclusively claimed 
as a specimen of American workmanship, which removes 
much of the responsibility for its bizarre appearance. 

A case also occurred in the glass-manufacture in the 
United States within a few years. A difificulty was ex- 
perienced in obtaining glass-blowers, and steps were taken 
to obtain workmen from England. One of the results of 
this was, that about fifty work-people — men of experi- 
ence in all branches of glass-manufacture — sailed from 



SKILLED LABOR FROM ABROAD. 141 

Liverpool for this country, induced to come here by the 
high wages offered by the agents of the American glass- 
makers. 

The deplorable lack of native skill in art-labor is not 
confined to ornamental work on our buildings, or in the 
decorative arts in pottery or glass-making ; it w^as nearly 
universal until quite recently. 

This incident affords an opportunity for a brief di- 
gression upon the subject of imported skilled labor which 
is becoming a very suggestive subject to the people 
of this country, especially those who work. There is 
nothing in the vast tide of immigration to the United 
States which attracts a more grateful interest than the 
large number of skilled workmen it includes. The table 
showing the number of immigrants, according to their 
occupations, prepared by Mr. J^immo, of the Treasury 
Department, for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1880, 
makes the following exhibit : 

Professional occupations 1,7Y2 

Skilled occupations 49,929 

Miscellaneous occupations 188,109 

Occupations not stated 2,194 

"Without occupation 215,252 

These figures are well calculated to attract attention. 
While every vocation and every profession in the United 
States, however crowded, receives large accessions from 
this mighty influx, we cannot but express our regret at 
the disproportion between those who have skilled occu- 
pations and those who have none at all. It is significant, 
if not alarming. Out of a total of 457,257, there were 
only 49^929 of the former, while of the latter there were 



142 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

215,252. In other words, those having no occupation 
are far in excess of the other immigrants, and nearly 
equal to them all combined. Out of those landing at 
Castle Garden, 143,182 remained in New York city 
alone. Whether the social and domestic influences of 
the American element, and its superiority in energy and 
experience, will be able to assimilate this enormous ac- 
cession to its population in a single city, and redeem it 
from the cosmopolitan character of the new-comers, is a 
question that must be postponed for results to determine. 
That year, to be sure, is distinguished by the largest im- 
migration that has ever been witnessed in the whole 
history of the country ; but it is considered quite certain 
that the number of immigrants for the present year (1882) 
will greatly exceed it. Nor is it wonderful that the 
eager eyes of the people in Europe should be turned to- 
ward the enchanting temptations of the West ; for when 
they come here willing to engage in honest work, or 
qualified in the best modes of improving our industry, 
and developing to a higher degree the arts of manufact- 
ure and the facilities of production, we are glad to re- 
ceive them under the flag of the Great Kepublic, and to 
make them co-equals in our prosperity and freedom. Our 
land is the neutral ground on which men of all creeds 
and nationalities can meet with safety, and enjoy the ad- 
vantages of political institutions essentially free. It is 
the permanent home of the husbandman, the artisan, and 
the industrious workman. The economic value of this 
kind of immigration has materially helped to swell our 
marvelous growth in wealth as well as in population. 
But it may well be doubted whether the country gains 
more than it suffers from the sweeping tide of immi- 



IMMIGRATIOK I43 

grants wlio, we have seen, have no vocation to depend 
upon for a livelihood. Undoubtedly among these last be- 
long the horde of ignorant and useless bummers who sell 
their votes and undertake the management of municipal 
affairs, and whose presence here adds to the difficulties 
with which our institutions have to contend. 

This influx of cheap labor, and of people having no 
occupation whatever, is assuming the guise of a serious 
problem, and there is a growing sense of responsibility 
for its practical consideration. It is of essential conse- 
quence, as bearing upon the question of wages ; and were 
it not for the sensitiveness of pohticians the whole sub- 
ject would at no distant day be exposed to the scrutiny 
of universal suffrage. The exclusion of the Chinese, who 
had no vote, is yet fresh ; but their numbers all told 
would not exceed the arrivals at Castle Garden in a single 
month. It would be instructive, for those who were so 
alarmed at the presence of a few Asiatics, to visit that 
place for the debarkation of immigrants, and compare 
its social elements with those of China Town in San 
Francisco. If he were alarmed before, he cannot be 
gratified with the spectacle he now sees. 

Among the persons who appeared before the Tariff 
Commission, during its recent session in the city of 'New 
York, was an American mechanic by the name of William 
A. Carsey, who had the courage and independence to ex- 
press some wholesome truths directly in point. He made a 
statement in behalf, he said, of that large class of work- 
ing-men who had a bitter experience of the folly of strikes, 
and he declared it to be for the interest of all classes that 
American industries should be protected against all for- 
eign competitive interests, or else the American laborer 



144 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

must be reduced to the wages and condition of the Eu- 
ropean laborer ; he therefore asked not only for a tariff 
on all goods and materials that can be produced in this 
country, but also for the prevention of the importation 
of cheap labor. He said that those for whom he spoke 
tried to be practical and just, and asked only for that 
which was admitted to be necessary to their own protec- 
tion ; that if the country was flooded with cheap goods 
and cheap labor, the result would be a war of classes, 
strikes, riots, and armed rebellion ; and he suggested that 
the commissioners should visit Castle Garden and see the 
classes of people that are being introduced from Europe 
to take the place of American workmen, and then visit 
the tenement sections of the city to witness their mode 
of living. 

This statement appeals at once to our reason and 
sympathies. The immense importation of foreign labor 
is rapidly reducing the condition of the American work- 
ing-man to that of an alien in his own country, and is 
gradually achieving the conquest of our national indus- 
tries. At least, the undeniable tendency is the reduction 
of wages for all kinds of work in the United States to 
the standard which prevails in Europe. The American 
workman, whether native or naturalized — and I put them 
both on the same footing — cannot sufiiciently consider an 
influence which bears so directly upon his life, his com- 
fort, and upon that of his family and associates. The 
evil is greatly increased by the conduct of powerful 
corporations, who And it less expensive to import their 
hands from across the ocean than to increase the wages 
of those they have to a fair living standard. 

The trades-unions have incurred a serious responsibil- 



TRADES-UNIONS AND APPRENTICESHIP. I45 

ity in this relation. They are composed, I dare say, of in- 
telligent and respectable workmen, who sincerely believe 
that, by limiting the number of apprentices, they are pro- 
viding a safeguard for their own craft and protection. 
In tliis, it seems, they are mistaken ; for the demand for 
skilled labor will be supplied from the surpkis in Europe, 
if it is not furnished by our own people. Within the 
last ten years such have been the giant strides of our 
manufactures that they are quite equal to one fourth part 
of the products of all Europe combined. Our domestic 
commerce has advanced until it exceeds that of any na- 
tion on tlie globe. Within the same period our popula- 
tion has increased to fifty millions, and w^e have construct- 
ed railroads in various parts of the country sufficient in 
length to form a circle twice around the earth's surface. 
Our foreign commerce— albeit in foreign ships — extends 
to every cranny of man's habitation. The manufacturing 
power of the country has nearly quadrupled, and all 
forms of skilled trades have multiplied in the same pro- 
portion ; and yet the unions, failing to appreciate these 
mighty transformations, adhere to their suicidal policy, 
and the workshop from which the American boy is ex- 
cluded is supplied by the surplus skilled labor of other 
nations. While this condition continues, there is no other 
alternative except to have an immigration sufficiently 
liberal to supply the deficiency. 

The value of the skilled workers is undeniable. As 
a general rule, they come to this country as affording a 
wider field of employment and greater promise of per- 
manent individual success, and through every stage of 
our progress we owe much to their instruction in many 
of the arts of life. We have not only naturalized them 



146 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

in our citizenship, but we have also naturalized their 
ingenuity, their workmanship, and much of what belongs 
to the skilled methods of their industry. We need not 
hesitate to acknowledge these benefits, for even the Greeks 
were indebted for the useful and even the most necessary 
arts to foreign instructors during every period of their 
transcendent history, and it was only after going through 
centuries of toil and hard work that Germany, France, 
and Great Britain have taken their rank among the civ- 
ilized nations of the earth. Their artisans are lured to 
this country, where they find a rich reward in reproduc- 
ing what is valuable in their arts to enrich our industry 
and promote our prosperity. They receive employment 
among the builders of New York, the potters of New 
Jersey, the glass-makers of Pittsburg, the silk-weavers, 
the carpet-makers, the steel- manufacturers, the jewelers, 
the gold and silver smiths, the machinists, the iron-found- 
ers, the bronze artists, the fresco-painters, the decorators, 
and indeed in all other industries where artistic work- 
manship and the art of design are the secrets of suc- 
cess. 

We shall undoubtedly continue to be dependent upon 
skilled labor from Europe until art education at home 
becomes a reality. Until this want is supplied the intro- 
duction of skilled workmen is a subject of special con- 
gratulation. It is the addition to our population which 
leads to the successful establishment of new industries 
and the improvement of old ones. By such means we 
are already enabled to enter into competition with the 
artistic workmanship of Europe in several of its most 
important industries. As an instance, " Sheffield is com- 
ing to America," is the heading of a paragraph which 



AMERICAN PORCELAIN. 147 

announGes that a well-known business house in that city 
engaged in the manufacture of steel for the American 
market, has organized a company for the manufacture of 
steel here. The workmen are from Sheffield, and the 
aim of the company will be to produce in this country a 
steel of as good quality as that made by them in England. 
This circumstance shows that Sheffield has been driven 
from one of its best markets by the steel-makers of our 
own country, and that our steel industry has expanded 
under the protection afforded by our legislation and by 
the introduction of skilled labor from abroad ; and it was 
gratifying to observe that our exhibits of steel at the 
Centennial challenged comparison with any other steel 
exhibit from any part of the world. 

There is perhaps no useful or decorative art which, 
from its recent commencement, has undergone such rapid 
improvement as that of American porcelain. Not only 
what we make, but wdiat we import, is decorated here, 
with great elegance and beauty of form, so that buyers 
can not, unless skilled in the trade, distinguish them from 
the European commodity. The splendor of our commer- 
cial industry is enriched by the increase and variety of 
our productions in this beautiful art. We know how 
successfully the French, Germans, and British have prac- 
ticed the manufacture of pottery, and the unprecedented 
beauty of their porcelain still gives them a very great 
advantage in the American market. 

Two names stand pre-eminent in the historical devel- 
opment of the potter's art — Bernard Palissy, of France, 
and Josiah "Wedgwood, of England. In speaking of the 
latter, in an address before a literary society in 1878, Mr. 
Gladstone made the following remarks : 



148 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

I cannot pass by the name of Wedgwood without 
a word. Perhaps I am a little given to what is called 
hero-worship, and Wedgwood is one of the heroes whom 
I worship. I do not hesitate to say that I consider Wedg- 
wood, taken altogether, to be the most extraordinary man 
whose name is recorded in the history of the commercial 
world. Putting together the whole of his qualities and 
the whole of his performance, Wedgwood completely 
revolutionized the character of the fabrics made in Eng- 
land in his period. He recalled into existence the spirit 
of Greek art. Whatever we may say of earthenware and 
porcelain manufacture prior to Wedgwood's period, it 
had never risen to the loftiness of the spirit of Greek art. 
If you compare the famous porcelain of Sevres — the vases 
of Sevres — with the vases of Wedgwood, or the forms of 
Chelsea and Bow work with the forms of AVedgwood, I 
do not hesitate to say tliat, in my opinion, they are greatly 
inferior. If you run your eye along this line of produc- 
tion of the eighteenth century in England [indicating] — 
although I am not by any means denying there are very 
good forms in others — those of Wedgwood stand pre- 
eminent. Although Wedgwood revived Greek art, al- 
though he seems to have shown he was not satisfied with 
the forms of Sevres, yet he did not revive classical forms 
in a servile spirit. Though in all his productions you are 
reminded of Greek art, they are not mere reproductions. 
His style is strikingly original ; and although, as the lec- 
turer has said, he was most powerfully aided by such men 
as Bentley, yet I may say what people have justly said 
of Queen Elizabeth and her ministers, Burleigh and 
Walsingham, " How came she to have these great minis- 
ters?" It was because of her judgment and discrimi- 
nation, which enabled her to bring them around her. 'Not 
only did Wedgwood completely revolutionize the char- 
acter of the fabrics, but he carried the manufacture of 
earthenware, which is not porcelain, to by far the high- 
est point which it has ever attained in any country in 
the world. Before the time of Wedgwood, England was 



GLADSTONE'S ENCOMIUM ON WEDGWOOD. 149 

not particularly distinguished in respect of the potter's 
art, and down to the eighteenth century, on the whole, 
we were importers and not exporters of pottery ; w^e learned 
from the world rather than supplied the world ; but from 
the hour "Wedgwood came upon the scene all this was 
altered, and we became great exporters of pottery, and, 
from St. Petersburg on the one hand to the Mississippi 
on the other, the name and the productions of Wedgwood 
became familiar and were everywhere met with. The 
crowning triumph that he achieved was this — that Con- 
tinental factories set about the attempted imitation of his 
works, and the Royal Factory of Sevres, richly and largely 
endowed by state funds, not only condescended to en- 
deavor to rival Wedgwood and his works, but directly 
imitated them. At the same time, it must be admitted 
that, great as was the power applied in their department 
of this art at Sevres, Sevres wedgwood is not equal to 
the genuine work of Josiah Wedgwood. Those who 
love the art of the potter and his works should ever bear 
in veneration the name of Wedgwood. 

Eem ember that this magnificent encomium is pro- 
nounced by a countryman of Watt and Stephenson, w^ho 
does not fear placing Wedgwood, the potter, alongside 
of these signal benefactors of the race. It may be said 
that he originated this industry in England, and that he 
carried it to a degree of excellence that has never been 
surpassed. His fabrics are to this day among the most 
precious and beautiful specimens of the art. His skill, 
industry, genius, and success have been emulated by others 
in the same track, who have furnished the cheapest earth- 
enware combined with the most beautiful forms of an- 
cient or modern art, and which for the last sixty years 
has constituted an important branch of British domestic 
and foreign commerce. 



150 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

Wedgwood began his improvement by inventing the 
materials of the ware. Kejecting the clays then in use, 
he selected the purest and whitest clays in the coun- 
try, combining them with chalk-flints, which he ground 
to powder and mixed with water until they attained 
the consistency of cream. He afterward evaporated 
the water by boiling the compound in large cisterns, until 
a composition was left of the most perfect uniformity 
throughout, and of a spotless white color. This paste 
was used either in the purely w^hite condition, or various- 
ly colored with blue, brown, or buff ; and with this ma- 
terial he produced imitations of the Etruscan vases, and 
of the various other works of ancient art, such as the world 
had never before seen, and such as no artist has ever since 
surpassed. Some of his productions were miracles of art. 
IS'ot only did he give the world a chea23 earthenware, but 
a recent writer awards him the praise of making the ex- 
quisite products of the sculptor's art in all ages familiar 
to every householder, so that the workmen in English 
shops and laborers in the field could use as buttons and 
ornaments gems of the glyptic art of the best ancient art- 
ists. 

As Wedgwood conferred upon England one of her 
most extensive industries, so Palissy bestowed upon 
France the manufacture of enameled pottery. This art 
had been known in China, no one knows how long, and 
her china-ware had been introduced to the Western na- 
tions by the Dutch, who at that period were the only 
Europeans having commercial relations with the Celes- 
tial Empire. It was also one of the many arts which the 
Saracens had carried into Europe, and from them un- 
doubtedly came its use in the majolica-ware of Italy. At 



PALISSY AND CERAMIC ART. 151 

tlie period of Palissy its manufacture was unknown in 
France. The story is familiar which represents Palissy 
finding an enameled cup, and being inspired by its beau- 
ty to discover the art which had produced it. He entered 
upon a series of the most extraordinary experiments, in 

\ which sound theoretical principles, heroic perseverance, 

\and handicraft skill were finally rewarded by the most 

I brilliant success — a success that has not only contributed 

/to elevate the taste and workmanship of his countrymen, 

/ but which has ever since afforded employment to many 
thousands of workshops, and furnished articles of beauty 
to pei^ons of cultured taste in every other part of the 
civilized world. 

It will probably be some years before American skill 
and perseverance can eclipse them all. In the higher 
productions of the ceramic art we are still deficient, 
furnishing not much more than one half of the ware con- 
sumed in the United States. Our fine work is said to be 
excellent so far as it goes, though chiefly performed by 
foreigners. We still import nearly eight millions in the 
glass and ceramic productions of Europe. Our finest china 
comes from Staffordsire, and our most artistic enamels from 

' Limoges and Dresden. Except by way of imitation we have 
produced little or nothing entitled to notice. There is 
no reason why we should not create a pottery entirely our 
own, full of originality, and with a general appearance 
of a distinct American type. We are the only one among 
the civilized nations that can show no type of our own in 
this the most ancient and the most indispensable of all 
the arts. Our manufactories have been in the habit of 
obtaining their styles and designs from abroad, as if they 
were floating fragments just come to hand ; and it must 



152 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

be confessed that these are mixed up sometimes with a 
great deal of critical selection, and re-emplojed in a man- 
ner which deserves the praise of being a striking resem- 
blance to the original. In this way we make Wedg- 
wood-ware, Italian majolica, Dresden and Limoges por- 
celain. But in this no particular taste is exemplified, ex- 
cept the fidelity of a copyist rather than the genius of de- 
sign — the ingenuity of transcribing, and not the faculty 
which creates. We must cease to imitate, and become in- 
ventors ; or, if we imitate, it ought not to be the designs, 
but the designing, which is originah We must strike out 
for ourselves^ and make still greater progress in the em- 
pire of industrial science, and learn to apply the laws 
which subordinate the employment of ornament to the 
objects and general requirements of design. It is by this 
simple means that others have readied the highest excel- 
lence, and we can overtop them all by the greater develop- 
ment of inventive faculties. Perhaps an exception should 
be made in regard to our exhibit at the Centennial. The 
" Centennial Yase," made at the Union Porcelain Works, 
Greenpoint, Long Island, is described as being exceed- 
ingly rich in color and peculiar in ornament. It is decid- 
edly American, the illustrations representing incidents in 
American history. The paintings are finely executed, and 
the whole effect is harmonious and attractive. Other speci- 
mens were exhibited, possessing great artistic merit. The 
prevailing ornamentation was of a patriotic nature. This 
style of decorating goods is to be encouraged, for it nour- 
ishes American genius, and invites our manufacturers to 
make their own designs, and leave off copying foreign 
ones. " Let them be original, and there is no doubt that 
their efforts will be crowned with success, and their 



AMERICAN POTTERY. -jko 

names become known everywhere." We freely give the 
highest prices paid in this generation for beautrful pot- 
tery, and no people are so willing to pay for artistic dec- 
oration. We have the clays, the silicas, and other in- 
gredients best fitted for the work. Our invention is pro- 
verbial, and has been displayed in all the virtues of pure- 
• ly useful art in every exposition where we have exhibited. 
"Why, then, should we remain at the lowest stage, where 
finish and design are concerned ? 

The principal centers of this manufacture in the Unit- 
ed States are Pittsburg, Cincinnati, Chicago, and Green- 
pomt, but perhaps the finest pottery is made at Trenton. 
Here, I believe, machinery was first extensively applied 
in the history of the art, or at least more extensively 
than elsewhere. The famous potter's wheel is now a 
piece of mechanism, and the clay is mixed into a close, 
fine, even-grained consistency by processes purely mechan- 
ical. The heavy work is done by machinery. 

The workmen, no doubt, do their w^ork exceedingly 
well, and many of them have become experts in all that 
appertains to the difficult and complex character of their 
trade. 

In the spring of 1879 a strike occurred among the 
potters at Trenton, and a correspondent, in describing the 
effect upon the business, mentions that new hands were 
pretty generally employed. His observations are so ap- 
propriate to our subject that I venture to transcribe a por- 
tion of them. He writes that — 

Many of those who are now in Mr. Davis' employ 
have received instructions in the highest branches of 
sclioiarship, some having even passed through a colleo-iate 
course, and, as educated men have more reason and quick- 



154 EDUCATION IN ITS EELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

er conception of the way to do tilings properly, these 
Americans will make the best workmen. A word here 
might not be amiss. Why do not more American young 
men turn their attention to this new branch of industry ? 
There is as good a field open for them in it as there ever 
was in " going West." Their education fits them to learn 
it thoroughly, and when they have done this, by the 
exercise of a little economy while being taught the busi- 
ness, and saving up a small capital, they can start out as 
manufacturers themselves. The best English potters of 
to-day have raised themselves from the bench to their 
present positions. What has been done can be done 
again. Now, most of the men employed in this line are 
foreigners ; why should not Americans take advantage of 
this opportunity of learning a good business, and being 
paid better wages for learning than they can earn by 
labor in any ordinary vocation ? 

Mr. Davis is a native of England ; he came to the 
United States some years ago, and commenced the busi- 
ness of which he is now the sole and responsible master. 

Without a theoretical knowledge of their trade our 
workmen are but imitators. Every potter should be a 
draughtsman, so that he could not only do the work 
with his own hands, but design it in his imagination. 
Drawing is but the representation of the object, or the 
embodiment in concrete form of that which is first cre- 
ated in the mind, and, if understood, the soul of the art- 
ist enters into his work. The time will come when no 
one will be reputed a good workman who cannot design 
as well as execute. Whoever is trained in a knowledge 
of the principles of his handicraft may become not mere- 
ly a workman, but a high artist. The man who can draw 
and model will show the value of his acquired knowledge 
by giving elegance of form, grace of outline, and beauty 



YALUE OF DRAWING IN PATTERN-FIGURES. 155 

of ornament to whatever lie produces ; and every effort 
will inspire him with motives to higher and better work. 
As he addresses the public eye with picturesque illustra- 
tions of his own taste, new sources of infinite enjoyment 
will be open to him ; and his serviceable attainment will 
glide into beautiful visions of his own feelings and enthu- 
siasm upon the various substances which the repertories 
of nature have spontaneously submitted to human indus- 
try. 

The value of drawing as a study is also realized as a 
charming accomplishment, when the pupil can give a fine 
delineation of a tree, a flower, a statue, or a building, 
which may have excited his fancy ; while the care he 
bestows upon a graceful design teaches his mind how to 
think, enlarges the scope of his imagination, and breathes 
the sentiment of his peculiar idea into the subject he has 
chosen for his pencil. 

Without attempting to give all the illustrations of 
this character, let us select one more example which is 
furnished by the process of applying colored patterns to 
cotton and woolen fabrics. It was not until about the 
beginning of the eighteenth century that calico-printing 
was practiced in modern Europe. The designs were first 
carved on wooden blocks in relief, and then laboriously 
printed by hand. These were superseded by copper, up- 
on which the most delicate lines of the designer could be 
traced, and impressed like an engraving upon the cloth. 
Then came roller-printing, by which each color was printed 
on the cloth as it lay stretched on a board, and the colors 
were laid on one after the other by the labor of men and 
women, very much, it may be supposed, as the colored 
lithographs or chromos of the present day. These im- 



156 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

provements in the machinery, by which so much labor has 
been saved, have been accompanied by discoveries in the 
production of brilliant colors, by inventions that engrave 
automatically the most intricate designs, and by constant 
appeals to the draughtsman for the most beautiful combi- 
nations in pattern-figures to print upon textile fabrics. 

The science of chemistry has achieved one of its great- 
est triumphs in this art, nor has this been the result of 
chance, but has come from experimental essays and an in- 
ductive application of recognized principles of greater or 
less generality. And while perhaps in no domestic art 
has machinery so much abridged the process of produc- 
tion, and secured so great a degree of economy in labor 
and expenditure, it is equally to be admitted that the 
dyer or calico-printer ought not only to understand the 
infusion of dye-stuffs and the chemical reaction of colors, 
but also the harmony of beautiful colors and how to dis- 
play and contrast them. He ought also to have taste in 
patterns, and judgment in applying them in the most 
effective manner to the textile fabrics he is to beautify. 
This he can discover by the accurate rules of drawing 
and the general principles of design. A vague impression 
of beauty, which is not decided by any fixed principle, is 
generally without any aim, and seldom grasps the proba- 
bilities of a design. A class of men have now come who 
are not only practically educated in this industry, but to 
whom the lessons of designing have yielded the grand 
secrets for which modern industry must ever be grateful. 

Take notice also how anxious we are to surround our 
every-day life with what is pleasant and agreeable ; hence 
the cabinet-maker is equally indebted to the aid of prac- 
tical designs in drawing, in order to furnish our homes, 



DKAWIXG AS A PRACTICAL ART. 157 

and make tliem comfortable and attractive. By this 
means he carves his wood, and veneers his mahogany, and 
puts together the most elaborate as well as the simplest 
pieces of furniture, and decorates them with beautiful 
fringes, tassels, and fixtures, until they exhibit every vari- 
ety of form and color. The jeweler, the engraver, the en- 
gineer, the naturalist, and the mathematician, can not hope 
to meet with much success when ignorant of the rudi- 
ments of this art. Beauty of form will give a practical 
value to the product of every trade. An ugly pattern is 
salable in no market. If any one desires to know how 
beauty and form and color of surface are preferred to the 
same class of articles not so embellished, he can inform 
himself in the store of any merchant who consults the 
tastes of his customers, and keeps a sharp lookout for the 
prevailing demands of trade. 

In a word, drawing is the most practical of all arts. 
It stamps its beautiful lines on every article. Its teach- 
ing should not be a specialty any more than writing. 
The whole community should be equally educated in its 
principles, for it would imbue the whole people with ele- 
vating and refining influences in the highest sense of our 
nature. 

Most of mankind go through life seeing comparative- 
ly little of what is so beautiful in the world; and we 
lose much of the enjoyment and pleasure that ought to 
charm our vision. To the cultivated eye all nature is 
ornamental, and beauty is seen everywhere. Even the 
atoms, that are invisible from their minuteness, are charm- 
ingly decorated when revealed under the lens of a micro- 
scope, and are capable of conveying intelligence from eye 
to eye and from mind to mind, when trained to a knowl- 



158 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

edge of the lines and curves that give beauty to natural 
objects, and the circles and ellipses which, adorn all vital 
forms. And yet most men go along, as if they were blind, 
and without the least idea how admirably adapted are all 
these forms to the purposes and utilities of life. Where 
the principles of design are fully comprehended, it will be 
discovered that this universal element of beauty is adapt- 
ed to the purposes of human culture and improvement, 
and that, by its proper appreciation, we may embellish our 
surroundings to any extent we may desire. A boy, who 
scarcely knows a pencil when he sees it, can drive the 
plowshare through the rich prairie-soil which responds 
in a harvest of grain. This is good and useful work. 
But another boy, who can also raise a crop, and who has 
had the advantage of an art education, takes a worthless 
piece of clay and some sand from under his feet, and, mix- 
ing them together, gives to the mass a beautiful form, and, 
placing it in the furnace, burns it in coloi's that will never 
lose their freshness or luster, and thus by ingenuity and 
taste combined produces a vase that brings gold from the 
rich and applause from all. Ten to one, the outline and 
details of the design came from his knowledge in drawing. 



CHAPTEE IX. 

Drawing (continued) — The Massachusetts act of ISYO — "Want of teachers — 
Normal Art School — Current methods of teaching drawing — Professor 
Kriisi's views — Drawing as an intellectual discipline — It compels ob- 
servation — Its influence upon the understanding and the imagination — 
It is an educational study. 

'Not more than twelve years ago (1882) there was 
probably not a competent teacher of industrial drawing 
in any of our public schools. To-day there are hundreds, 
and the number is constantly increasing ; and it is espe- 
cially interesting that the regular teachers are now so 
well trained in the art that they are giving the best in- 
struction. The public schools of Massachusetts have 
been foremost in this educational movement. In 1870, 
by an act of her Legislature, drawing was made a re- 
quired study in all her schools. 

The second section of the act is worthy of constant 
reference. It is as follows: "Any city or town may, 
and every city and town having more than ten thousand 
inhabitants shall annually make provision for giving free 
instruction in industrial and mechanical drawing to per- 
sons over fifteen years of age, either in day or evening 
schools, nnder the direction of the school committee." 
The statute was a concej)tion of paramount importance, 
but how could it be carried into practical operation in 



160 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

the absence of teachers trained in the art, and without 
plan or system in its execution? At this day we can 
scarcely appreciate the perplexities of the task. There 
were no precedents. The legislative act was regarded in 
many quarters as empirical quackery. A study which 
was looked uj^on as purely technical had to be made popu- 
lar ; and what had never been done before was to be ac- 
complished where competent teachers, text-books, courses 
of study, and even the implements for instrumental in- 
struction, had all to be created. The want of competent 
teachers was a serious drawback to success. It was like 
a ship on board of which all were utterly ignorant of 
the rules of navigation. In the annual report of the Sec- 
retary of the Board of Education for the year 1878 it is 
stated that — 

It had been found to be impractical to maintain the 
evening industrial drawing classes for mechanics, or to 
introduce drawing into the public day-schools, and thus 
give effect to the act of 1870, without the assistance of 
persons properly trained and qualified to give instruction 
in the subject. From this cause the evening classes lan- 
guished, and little progress was made in the public schools. 
It was therefore suggested to the Board of Education 
that teachers of industrial drawing must be provided, or 
the act of 1870 would remain inoperative. 

This gave rise to the State Normal Art School, which 
the Legislature established in 1873, for the sole j)urpose 
of preparing teachers of drawing for all the other schools 
of the State. The same difficulty had been experienced 
abroad and overcome in the same way. The ]N"ormal Art 
School was placed under the direction of Professor Smith, 
and has been attended with results that elicited the favor- 



DRAWING IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 161 

able opinion of tlie foreign commissioners who visited our 
Centennial Exposition, especially those from France al- 
ready mentioned. Special teachers in drawing even in 
the high-schools are no longer employed, and the regular 
teachers now do the work, and the pupils are learning 
more and better than under the rule of specialists. In 
the report on drawing for 1880 the number of teachers 
in the public schools of Boston is set down at 1,045, and 
of these 1,040 have attended the classes in the l^ormal 
Art School ; or, in other words, all but -Q-ve of the whole 
number have been prepared by normal instruction to 
teach industrial drawing in the public schools of the city, 
including free-hand drawing, drawing in design, from 
dictation, memory, model, and geometrical. I do not 
refer to the statistics of the free evening drawing classes 
for want of the reports on that subject. These are more 
particularly designed for the instruction of mechanics and 
workmen ; and when we consider that drawing is at the 
basis of every constructive art, the knowledge to be de- 
rived from its principles must be invaluable in the prac- 
tice of their trade. The stud}^ is conquering its way into 
favor. Art-education stands high in public favor. Ex- 
cept in special localities a great change has taken place, 
and it is considered as indispensable to the material suc- 
cess of individuals and communities. Its refining influ- 
ence is permeating society and elevating labor. 

Methods of instruction were adoj^ted in 'New York 
and other important cities with equally satisfactory re- 
sults. But not only were teachers in a less advanced 
state ; the books on drawing were so abstract and tech- 
nical that they could not be introduced into the public 
schools with any hope of teaching children. With a 



162 EDUCATION IN ITS EELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

view to tlie practical development of tlie art in common- 
scliool education, a progressive plan of elementary studies 
is indispensable — one wliich presents tlie primary prin- 
ciples of drawing to the comprehension of the young- 
est pupils. The children are to be initiated into the lan- 
guage of form, which is not picked up as they do their 
mother tongue. They must be trained to understand in 
what exact form consists, and by what means it is pro- 
duced. The plan generally adopted in our public schools 
is to lead the students forward by easy steps, teaching 
them first to draw straight and curved lines on their 
slates, or from cards prepared for their use ; then to com- 
bine these lines into various geometrical figures, with 
explanations of the relation in which they stand to each 
other as parts of triangles, squares, spheres, oblongs, etc. 
In some of the most successful systems of teaching, the 
pupils are also furnished with blocks of various shapes, 
which they arrange into a great variety of solid figures. 
This not only excites their interest, but, while arranging 
the parts into unities, the faculties of representation and 
invention are exercised in a very marked and practical 
manner. The characteristic features of each form are 
discriminated — such as that a square has four angles, 
that the sides are equal, and the opposite ones are parallel ; 
that a triangle is bounded by three lines, that it has three 
angles, and that a right-angled triangle has one right 
angle ; the opposite side is the hypothenuse, the other 
sides are called respectively the base and perpendicular. 
And in like manner they learn the peculiarities of the 
numerous figures presented in the early lessons, and the 
technical terms by which they are designated. They also 
acquire skill in distinguishing the parts from the whole. 



DRAWING IN THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 163 

and a knowledge of the arrangement by which they con- 
stitute a unit. They practice upon the details of an illus- 
tration until they can reproduce it upon the blackboard ; 
and they possess this accomplishment by experience and 
deduction, for they first become familiar with the constitu- 
ent elements and can then make a representation of the 
form. It results from this process that the pupil who has 
looked upon a figure and become acquainted with its vari- 
ous elements can reproduce its likeness with clearness and 
precision from memory alone. At this point of study 
the creative powers of the imagination are awakened, 
and the student begins to put lines into forms of natural 
objects, or of the ideals that spring up in his own mind, 
and he invents little designs which perhaps delight no- 
body so much as himself. 

In order to increase the interest in the study, the 
pupils are encouraged to draw in outline any object that 
may attract their attention, so that simple forms of any 
kind composed of straight and curved lines, and exhibit- 
ing the feature of geometrical development, are to be 
used successfully to impress the mind w^ith the lessons. 

This is, of course, an extremely meager sketch of 
what I understand to be the general plan of primary in- 
struction. In the courses and grades which follow, atten- 
tion is given to the facts which constitute technical draw- 
ing, the representation of form as seen by the eye, the 
conventionalization from leaf and flower, and the applica- 
tion of drawing in design, machine and architectural con- 
struction ; while the historical styles of ornament com- 
mand special attention fr^m the teacher as well as the 
pupil. This includes the formation of the various geo- 
metrical figures, the principles of curvilinear drawing. 



164 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. i 

isometrical drawing, tlie study of perspective, and of I 
shade and shadow, and so mucli of mechanical drawing 

as will impart at least the rudiments of that important art i 

to those who will have practical use for its application, i 

These lessons are graded, and advance from the simplest ' 

rudiments to the most complicated forms of construction. | 

The student is furnished with the fullest illustrations ! 

and models all through the course. Free-hand and in- j 

strumental drawing are employed respectively where ! 

they are best adapted to the stage of the work. \ 

It will thus be seen that the present system begins by | 
teaching how to draw straight lines, and advances gradu- 
ally until the principles and practice of drawing are quite i 
well understood. Each lesson is a new starting-point for \ 
something still more advanced, and each grade when \ 
mastered is an intellectual conquest which forms a basis ! 
for achieving those above. The traditional system of | 
"picture-painting," and drawing "the figure from cop- 
ies," is abandoned, and in its place the aim is imitation ! 
and a logical appreciation of right lines and curves ; and, 
later, the representation of objects and the elements of i 
perspective ; and instead of drawing the human figure, ! 
the students are required to practice themselves in geo- 
metrical and in shaded perspective, in drawing geomet- 
rical solids, ornament in relief, and conventional exam- ; 
pies from the forms of leaves and decorative flowers. 
This reform is confirmed by the valued example of all 
our large cities, in which the subject has, in the course of j 
late years, received the closest attention. I 

The only serious danger lies*in the tendency to give an j 
undue portion of time to the study of ornament or decora- 
tive design, and the consequent desire of the pupils to ' 



INDUSTRIAL DRAWING. 1(55 

become artists instead of artisans, and to make pretty pict- 
ures instead of drawings. Bj the present system young 
men are not instructed in any manual work or in the use- 
fulness of labor. Four hundred appointments of clerks 
were announced in the Interior Department at Washing- 
ton, and there were five thousand applications for the 
places. Let any business man advertise for a clerk, and 
he will be overwhelmed in a few hours with all sorts of 
answers. The public has strong grounds of complaint at 
this result of school instruction. Designers do good work, 
and no class of men have done more to improve indus- 
trial products and increase employments; but when we 
consider that most of the children in our public schools 
ought to be destined for the various industrial pursuits, 
the aim of teaching should be to prepare them for an 
'^ industrial career," and to furnish them with such rules 
of drawing as can be usefully apj^lied by workmen in 
their different trades. The means of avoiding this tend- 
ency are found in the Massachusetts act, which requires 
the instruction to be "industrial and mechanical draw- 
ing." Every exertion should be made to ap2)]y the stat- 
ute for the benefit of industry and the improvement of 
manufactures. Perhaps it is inexperience which leads 
the writer to think that, after learning the elementary 
princij)les of geometrical drawing and ornament, and the 
representation of objects according to their appearance, 
lessons in mechanical drawing could be readily under- 
stood and frequently given. Improvement in the art of 
design improves all the manufactures to which it is ap- 
plied, and has suggested not only new branches of useful 
art, but has revived many of those that had been forgot- 
ten or fallen into disuse. It is proper, therefore, that 



166 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

ornament and design should occupy a prominent place 
in the system. Mechanical drawing depends more upon 
rules and instruments, affords but little scope for the 
imagination, and is perhaps less attractive, because it 
does not appeal to our sense of the beautiful. But we 
must also remember that the best of workmen wdll con- 
stantly blunder for the want of knowing the simple rules 
of mechanical drawing. Those who are gifted to become 
artists, will have in the technical schools of design ample 
opportunity to acquire a knowledge of the high art-prin- 
ciples to rej)resent the ideals of their imagination. The 
public school has humbler work to perform. Subordinate 
to its educational influence, the main stress should be laid 
upon industrial drawing, and its economic aspect ought 
to be recognized. 

The trades are very few in which a knowledge of 
mechanical drawing is not useful. The carpenter lays 
off his work by its rules, and even the plasterer runs his 
moldings around tbe arches and elliptical forms of his 
designs according to its principles ; and if the machinist, 
in working from his drawings, should mistake the meas- 
urements in the merest fraction, more or less, it might 
destroy the machine unless reconstructed ; and if it were 
started it might be torn into pieces with whatever of col- 
lateral injuries. A machine-shop can not be found with- 
out the instruments used in mechanical drawing ; but 
very few of the young mechanics know how to apply 
them, unless they have received rudimentary instruction 
in their school-days ; and except the machinist, the brick- 
layer, the mason, the engineer, and the builder, are some- 
what skilled in its practical rules, they run the risk of 
waste of time and material, and of always remaining at 



MECHANICAL DRAWING. 167 

the bottom of tlieir profession. How else can they de- 
termine the correctness of a drawing, or work out its 
minutiae ? In all the mechanic arts it is clear that the 
work must be planned upon paper in outline and eleva- 
tion, and the workmen must be able to read it correctly 
in order to construct and shape the object so that it will 
literally materialize the image of the di*aughtsman in all 
its details. Eobert Stephenson could find but little in the 
drawing formula of his day that precisely enabled him 
to construct his locomotive, but he arrived at his meas- 
ures and systems by arduous and original experiments. 
In this he was aided by other engineers, who were per- 
haps more skilled in the principles of mechanical drawing, 
which is an almost indispensable aid to the inventive 
powers. The iron horse is harnessed to steam, and man- 
ufactured by those who think but little of the wonderful 
tentative processes which first give it form and energy. 

I suppose that mechanical perspective, and the vari- 
ous forms of projection, constitute the leading features of 
mechanical and architectural drawing. Their teaching 
has been introduced into the public schools of 'New York 
and Boston, but I have not seen any report upon the 
progress made. Its teaching to the children in the more 
advanced classes, as a regular branch of instruction in the 
public schools, is of the greatest importance to the numer- 
ous industries pursued in our large cities. The subject is 
also one of universal interest. The ordinary accidents to 
which we are exposed arise in too many instances from 
some error in the work of the draughtsman or the machin- 
ist. The unexpected fall of buildings, and their bad con- 
struction in case of fire, are sometimes attended with hor- 
rors that curdle the blood and sweep away precious lives 



168 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

witli the most excruciating deaths. The wheel or axle of 
the locomotive may be unsound in material or model, and 
the train in its rapid flight plunged over a viaduct, bruis- 
ing and maiming its living freight, and sending our best 
and most beloved ones into the grave without warning or 
preparation. Boilers explode, machines are shattered, 
owing to defective work of some kind, and the newspa- 
pers publish a daily catalogue of disasters more appalling 
than the carnage of war. The lesser evils are also con- 
siderable. Think of the annoyance and discomfort of ill- 
constructed furniture, of imperfect and botchy utensils, 
and of wretched and degrading forms of household con- 
veniences which still remain ! Many methods have been 
devised to protect us against these dangers and troubles. 
But amono^ the most eifective of all remedies will be the 
brain and hand guided by the skill in mechanical draw- 
ing, that is absolutely necessary to the nature of the work 
to be performed, or the object to be created. 

To Professor Kriisi's '^Manual for Teachers" we are 
indebted for many weighty observations on the practical 
value of drawing, and from it I borrow the following 
passages : 

Besides its importance as an educational process, 
drawing is of great practical value in most of the voca- 
tions in life. It is indispensable to the highest success 
in most of the mechanical pursuits. The man who can 
illustrate his ideas with his pencil rises from the lower 
to the higher walks of his calling. He plans as well as 
executes, and he falls naturally into his place as leader 
and director. The carpenter who draws well becomes 
foreman, and not unfrequently architect. The machinist 
who draws, in many instances, becomes a successful in- 
ventor. 



PROFESSOR KRUSrS VIEWS. 1(59 

Ability to draw is of great value to the farmer. By 
its means tie plots his ground and divides his fields. By 
it he plans his house, adapting it to its surroundings and 
to its uses. By it he is able to describe the peculiar vege- 
tation, the name of which is unknown to him, and the 
kind of insect which destroys his crop. By it he fashions 
his utensils and tools, and communicates his thoughts to 
others in a thousand instances where ordinary language 
fails. 

In the various manufactures, workmen are in con- 
stant demand who have some aptitude and skill in de- 
signing. In engineering and in architecture, drawing is 
an integral part of the professional work. Even to those 
engaged in the learned professions, drawing may be made 
of use in various kinds of investigation, and in affording 
amusement for leisure hours. 

Indeed, the exceeding importance of the study re- 
ceives a new impulse, as it is seen that the language of 
form is essential in all the pursuits of a busy life. The 
products of industry and the question of education are 
bound together for the benefit of the rising generation ; 
and the workmen are trained to think, to combine, and 
to open their eyes to whatever is beautiful in their work. 
A great change has taken place ; and no one can now 
doubt the capacity of our people for the study of art, 
either in its application to industry, or to what may be 
called its aesthetics. 

Systems or series of text-books in industrial draw- 
ing, upon the progressive plan, have been used in the 
public schools for several years ; and it is gratifying to 
know that this simple and practical scheme of instruction 
has effectually contributed to establish this study as a 
branch of popular education. It is now taught very gen- 
erally by persons of professional knowledge and practical 



lYO EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

experience, wlio are familiar with the text-books best 
adapted to the actual needs of the schools ; and it is a 
matter of sincere congratulation that industrial drawing 
is a recognized study in nearly all the leading cities of 
the Union. 

The study of the art of drawing is also recommended 
as a means of intellectual discipline. We all acknowl- 
edge the powerful influence exerted by the use of lan- 
guage upon mental operations. Says a profound philoso- 
pher : * " Man, in fact, only obtains the use of his faculties 
in obtaining the use of speech ; for language is the indis- 
pensable means of the development of his natural powers, 
whether intellectual or moral." JSTow, drawing is the uni- 
versal language of form. If speech can be called the 
mother, drawing is certainly the godmother, of knowledge. 
The sensible objects which surround us, and the percep- 
tion of their form, dimensions, and color, constitute our 
knowledge of the external world. We may attempt to 
describe them in words, but a drawing satisfies and in- 
structs the mind with a precision and rapidity that be- 
long only to the crayon. The power of thinking and 
the power of drawing are inseparable. It is impossible 
to succeed in drawing a figure, unless every line is con- 
sidered in its relation to the object delineated. The 
whole structure depends upon a balance of details. It is 
a work of reflection throughout, and the process can only 
be carried on by forethought at every point of its evolu- 
tion. A child in committing a lesson exercises the fac- 
ulty of memory, but he rises in the scale of thought when 
he arranges a few lines into forms resembling the object 
which he sees, and to which words can only give a tran- 

* Sir William Hamilton's " Logic," p. 98. 



DRAWING AS A MENTAL DISCIPLINE. 17X 

sient expression. In drawing, tlie mind itself works as 
well as the hand in elaborating these unmeaning lines 
into concrete images of vivid and enduring symmetry. 

Drawing opens the perceptions of the pupil. He is 
almost in the obscurity of night, perceiving little and dis- 
criminating less in the objects which present themselves. 
But now his senses are exercised and trained to observa- 
tion, and it is like light dawning upon the darkness. He 
not only recognizes whole objects, like houses, trees, and 
animals, but he discriminates the component parts, he fixes 
their position and relation to each other. By this means 
he acquires immediate knowledge in regard to the science 
of natural objects and also of those created by art. He 
perceives points of inquiry worthy of attention in every- 
thing that flits before the eye. The leaves upon the trees 
and the blades of grass in the field are regarded with that 
scrutiny which such an exact study as drawing peculiarly 
requires. It assists the artisan at his work and the scholar 
in the highest range of perceptive philosophy. 

Its influence upon the understanding is not less salu- 
tary. It is a study of the real things in the world around 
us. Objects which are dim and meaningless to others, 
are full of methodical arrangement to the student of draw- 
ing. He is quick to discern the plan upon which they 
are organized, and the harmonizing beauty and order in 
all created things. 

By an act of the imagination he invents designs that 
would be utterly beyond his power, were it not for the 
forms and rules which drawing furnishes. 

A leaf or a flower in the art of drawing can only be 
produced by the exercise of the faculty of conceiving how 
lines of different kinds can be combined to represent the 



172 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

distinguishing parts of these objects, and to show the re- 
lation tiiey bear to each other. The stem and the veins 
in the leaf, the petal and the calyx in the flower, have 
their peculiar shape and position in forming the whole. 
The endowment of thought must be exercised so as to 
combine the lines in the direction best suited to give ef- 
fect to the different parts of the figure. Whatever the 
object may be — a bronze or a vase — the pupil is required 
to recognize distinctions, and to shape his outlines to give 
them the degree of prominence which will be true and 
harmonious. This work ought to be a model of exacti- 
tude and grace, and minute details are to be scrupulously 
studied. 

In a word, the intelligence of the draughtsman is put 
in action, and he becomes the author of combinations in 
forms and designs under the impulse or by the inspiration 
of his own genius. He is distinguished by his singular 
ingenuity, address, and superiority in the arts of life with 
which or upon which he is employed. 

It is also educational in the true and strict application 
of that term. To convey any special proportion of the 
material of knowledge, is properly called education. 
Drawing is essentially an operation of the intellect, in 
which the hand, the eye, and other parts of the physical 
system co-operate. It molds these faculties to certain 
elements of knowledge both intellectually and physically. 
Professor Kriisi, to whom I have already adverted, holds 
that drawing is of the greatest benefit " intellectually in 
compelling correct observation, and in inciting thought 
which depends upon observation." It is almost incredi- 
ble that so little was formerly done to instruct our chil- 
dren in a species of knowledge upon which the useful 



DRAWING AS A MENTAL DISCIPLINE. 173 

pursuits of life depend for so many beneiits, and which 
at the same time contributes as much to the material and 
social improvement of the race as to the most elevated 
sentiments and conceptions of the artist. And yet the 
subject had no place in ordinary education, and the prac- 
tical necessities, to which it is of the highest importance, 
were.totally ignored. It is now very generally recognized 
as a systematic study in the course of public-school edu- 
cation. We have seen how it draws forth the perceptive 
powers, quickening the understanding and the imagina- 
tion, and directing these transcendent endowments of the 
intellect in a great variety of ways to the needs and well- 
being of modern life. 

With the general remark that all true intellectual cult- 
ure depends upon the enrichment of the intuitive facul- 
ties, I claim for the art of drawing a permanent place in 
the programmes of public teaching.* 

* The report of the Commissioner of Education for 1882-83 first makes 
its appearance while this chapter is in press. It contains a statement of 
the conclusions of the Royal Commissioners (English) on technical instruc- 
tion in the different countries of Europe and the United States. As we 
have stated in a subsequent chapter, they made a preliminary report in 
February, 1883, which referred exclusively to France, and displayed the 
activity there in all that relates to the instruction of artisans. The final 
report is now made public. In regard to the particular subject of draw- 
ing, they say : 

For instruction in drawing, as applied mainly to decorative work in 
France, and to both constructive and decorative work in Belgium, the op- 
portunities are excellent. The crowded schools of drawing, modeling, 
carving, and painting, maintained at the expense of the municipalities of 
Paris, Lyons, Brussels, and other cities — absolutely gratuitous, and open to 
all comers, well lighted, furnished with the best models, and under the care 
of teachers full of enthusiasm — stimulate those manufactures and crafts 
in which the fine arts play a prominent part to a degree which is without 
parallel in this country (England). Instruction in art applied to industry 
and decoration is now pursued with energy in South Germany and in sev- 
eral of the northern Italian towns, and the influence of this instruction on 



174 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

the employment of the people is becoming very conspicuous in those coun- 
tries. The government schools of applied art in France, under the decree 
of 1881, of which the Limoges Decorative Arts School is the earliest ex- 
ample, and which, like the above-mentioned schools, are gratuitous, should 
be mentioned in this connection. . . . 

Among the recommendations is the following : 

The board recommends, for public elementary schools, that rudiment- 
ary drawing be incorporated with writing, as a single elementary subject, 
and that instruction in elementary drawing be continued throughout the 
standards (classes) ; that drawing from casts and models be required as 
part of the work, and that modeling be encouraged by grants ; that a 
school shall not be deemed to be provided with sufficient and suitable ap- 
paratus of elementary instruction unless it have a proper supply of casts 
and models for drawing ; that proficiency in the use of tools for working 
in wood and iron be paid for as a " specific subject," the work to be done, 
when practicable, out of school-hours ; that the collection of objects, casts, 
and drawings for school museums be encouraged ; that children under four- 
teen in England, as already in Scotland, be prohibited from working " full 
time " in factories and workshops ; and that, for the rural schools, instruc- 
tion in agriculture be made obligatory in the upper grades.— Jiepor I of the 
Commissioner of Education^ 1882-83. 



CHAPTEE X. 

Technical education of artisans — Art-industry — Industrial school — Appren- 
ticeship — Ti'ades-unions — Restriction in the number of apprentices — 
No restriction except want of character — Trades to provide technical 
instruction — University extension in England — American boys — Clerks 
and artisans — Manual skill and literary education — Duty of parents — 
Apprentice-schools in Belgium — Truth and knowledge. 

HiaHLY, however, as I estimate the importance of 
instruction in drawing, yet something more is needed in 
order to meet the necessities of our various industries. 
Art ideas must be supplemented by practical workman- 
ship, for both must render their assistance in embellishing 
articles of utility which administer to the physical wants 
of man, as well as to those which look to beauty only and 
the artistic tastes which grow out of it. To compete 
successfully with foreign work, we must have a class of 
artisans as highly cultivated in workmanship as those we 
import from over the sea ; and this skill can only be ac- 
quired by practice in their respective handicrafts. It is 
true that with us applied science and mechanical powers 
have superseded in a great measure the burden of heavy 
labor ; but the quick eye, the expert hand, and the acute 
taste can never be dispensed with in the manual processes 
of the arts and manufactures. To meet this imperative 
demand for first-class workmen, without submitting to 



176 EDUCATION IX ITS KELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

the exactions and competition of foreign artists, we must 
educate the constructive ability of our youth during the 
period of life which is now devoted to study alone. We 
have developed in a very high degree the arts of manu- 
facture ; but we are nearly without any American arti- 
sans in the trades connected v/ith design ; and are con- 
sequently deprived of the acknowledged sharpness and 
ingenuity of our own countrymen in helping on Amer- 
ican industries. This wide and remunerative field of 
employment is left to be occupied by partly educated and 
skilled foreigners. We have excellent schools for all 
sorts of instruction in the essentials of mathematics, his- 
tory, literature, and philosophy ; but we fit nobody with 
either skill or knowledge in any particular habit of indus- 
try. The United States in 1880 contained 189,000 ele- 
mentary schools, having 9,720,000 pupils. The govern- 
ment expenditure for education in the several States was 
$81,719,000. There were in addition 220 normal schools 
with 26,000 pupils. These figures in regard to expendi- 
ture surpass those of England and Wales nearly five times, 
and those of France nearly four times. In the number 
of pupils and the expenditure of means we lead the world ; 
and yet in our magnificent system of public instruction 
we have not class-room for a single student in any branch 
connected with industry. 

There are numerous institutions in France and Ger- 
many in which elementary education and industry are 
taught at the same time ; the design being to imbue the 
pupils with the rules of art and the rudiments of knowl- 
edge while training them in some branch of industry, and 
thus to utilize the former and elevate the latter as much 
as possible in a practical way. We have also dwelt, in a 



ART-INDUSTRY. 1Y7 

former part of this work, upon the advances made by 
England within the last thirty years, in forming the con- 
nection between the principles of art and her industrial 
pursuits. 

Indeed, art-industry is beginning to play an important 
part in the progress of nations, and is already regarded in 
all civilized countries as a source of national wealth and 
power. The establishment of schools for the instruction 
of those engaged in our trades and manufactures is, there- 
fore, often the subject of examination in the public jour- 
nals, especially in the trade magazines, and in essays de- 
livered at educational institutes and social-science con- 
ventions. The effort, now so general throughout the 
United States, to introduce instruction in drawing as a 
branch of public education, can not be misapprehended. 
The period appears to have arrived when institutions of 
industrial science and education can no longer be post- 
poned, and when they must be tried in this country on as 
large a scale as those witnessed abroad. There seems no 
reason why the institutional system should not be adapted 
to the tradesman, the artisan, and the manufacturer, as well 
as to the more pedantic professions in which men are so 
thoroughly trained. The reform of our taste has com- 
menced by the purifying influence which proceeds from, 
and which will gradually make its way through, the com- 
munity from the universal teaching of drawing. An ap- 
peal must now be made in behalf of teaching the pro- 
cesses of production as well as the principles which shall 
guide the work. The use of tools and machinery does not 
come by intuition, and industrial knowledge ought to in- 
clude instruction in their use. 

The arts and industries of life are hereafter to be 
9 



178 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

largely carried on by their instrumentality. There is also 
a universal desire to bestow, even upon goods of the hum- 
blest kind, beauty of form and some of the elegancies of 
art. A great point in trade is, therefore, to make useful 
work beautiful. Beauty is a salable commodity ; and the 
artisan who can add it to his work enhances its value and 
brings profit to his trade. A knowledge of how to work 
and a knowledge of how to render that work attractive 
are equally necessary ; and success can only be attained by 
a constant and determined effort to combine them in the 
workshop and the manufactory. The suggestion is be- 
coming familiar that the industrial school should be es- 
tablished as a part of the public-school system, for the 
practical as well as theoretical education of the children, 
at least in the rudiments of the various industrial and me- 
chanical pursuits for which they possess a natural talent. 
We can not regard the present generation of American 
youth without giving this problem our serious thought. 
The situation of American boys is critical and alarming. 
They are not trained, as in former periods, in a knowl- 
edge of any mechanical art ; and the consequence is, that 
skilled workmen among our native population are seldom 
to be met with. The general education (although most 
excellent in itself) imparted at the public schools disin- 
clines them to seek employment in any of the trades, 
while the system of apprenticeship, by which a course of 
instruction (such as it was) was formerly given in some 
particular trade, has almost ceased to exist. At that pe- 
riod the humble industries were mostly pursued at home 
or in an adjoining shop. An ordinary street-shop was 
often the whole establishment, which contained the stock 
and the work of the humble manufactory. Here the ap- 



APPRENTICESHIP AND THE TRADES-UNIONS. 179 

prentice was taught in the dexterity of his craft, and often 
became a member of the household of his master. This 
view is treated as a picturesque reminiscence which will 
do very well to talk about, but which presents no point of 
interest to the craftsman of this day. The time of small 
industries has passed away, and in their place we have 
immense establishments employing hundreds of work- 
men ; and instead of human muscle we employ the assist- 
ance of applied science and economic machinery. With 
these improved methods we have rejected the old cus- 
toms, without adopting anything in their place to supply 
the ever-increasing demand for mechanical ability. Be- 
sides, by the rules of various trades-unions, all beyond a 
very limited number of boys are prevented from acquir- 
ing a knowledge of their respective trades. In the large 
cities, these societies usually include in their membership 
the greater part of the employes in the industrial pursuits, 
and such are their organization and resources that they can 
often enforce their regulations, or produce serious embar- 
rassment to their employers. Information is to the effect 
that the number of apprentices allowed will average prob- 
ably only one boy to every seven workmen ; that, while 
in some trades more liberal rules prevail, in others the 
proportion of apprentices is still less. The total inade- 
quacy of this principle to supply the country with skilled 
workmen is a matter of universal complaint ; and the best 
friends of the industrial classes must deeply regret that 
societies which are capable of so many advantages should 
have adopted the mistaken idea of monopolizing any 
particular trade, by restricting the number of those who 
shall learn it. There is apparently some reason in the 
doctrine that a man who has acquired his skill by years 



i 
180 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. \ 

of labor and study, and who has become an efficient work- j 
man by his own aptitude and diligence, should have a I 
perfect right to select and limit those to whom he will i 
give instruction. It is an accomplishment personal to j 
himself as much as the tools of his trade ; and why, he I 
askSj should we expect him to impart his knowledge to ! 
others any more than to give away his property ? If this 
reasoning applied to property only, any one would be 
quite ready to admit it ; but the knowing how to do a 
thing well stands on a different title from that of a bale 
of merchandise. Few mechanics have learned their trade 
without instruction in the manufactory or workshop, and i 
I dare say they never dreamed that they were infringing j 
•upon anything in the exclusive nature of property. | 

Besides, labor is the only means which the great mass i 
of mankind must rely upon for subsistence. They are i 
born to this destiny ; and to deprive them of that which I 
will enable them to labor is to deprive them of their \ 
birthright. It not only limits industry, cuts off employ- 
ments, and diminishes the productive power of society, 
but exposes men to all the evils which are engendered by ; 
want of regular employment. The members of the union 1 
societies are undoubtedly respectable, intelligent, and well- \ 
meaning men, and do not intend to produce consequences 
such as we have just been reflecting upon ; but we shall i 
presently see the effects of their mistaken policy upon the \ 
rising generation of our own youth. The exclusive right ; 
to a trade in a particular class is entirely inconsistent with I 
a convenient division of labor, for it interdicts all me- ' 
chanical industry to the great mass of American children, ; 
and interferes with their right to exercise their skill and 
industry for their own support. And if each trade has ; 



APPRENTICESHIP AND THE TRADES-UNIONS. 181 

its own association and rules of restriction, then every 
important branch of human industry is closed against all 
but the favored few. 

Kow, we are well aware that mankind are not gifted 
with the intuitive faculty of effecting the changes of crude 
substances into useful and desirable articles of consump- 
tion. All the mechanic arts have advanced to their pres- 
ent state of perfection by a gradual process of invention 
and adaptation. The enormous mechanical powers and 
wonderful machinery now in use have been reached by 
the trials and experience of many generations. Both sci- 
ence and art, man's application, ingenuity, and necessi- 
ties, have from the earliest ages united their energies in 
producing the diversified callings and pursuits of our 
modern civilization. And now the idea is distinctly pre- 
sented that these pursuits were not for the general good 
of the race which had accomplished them, but for the 
particular occupation of a privileged class. It seems to 
me that the proposition answers itself and needs no argu- 
ment. 

I have no fault to find with the principle upon which 
trade societies are generally organized. They have exist- 
ed during the whole period of industrial history ; and, if 
they would adopt no other tests in selecting apprentices 
than those having reference to their physical capacity, 
age, and moral character, I would leave the matter to the 
discretion of each particular trade, upon condition that 
there ought to be a practical course of instruction in each 
shop, and some skilled workmen to whom the apprentice 
could apply for explanation as a matter of right. Each 
society should also provide a course of technical instruc- 
tion for the members as well as the apprentices. Fro- 



182 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

fessor Fleeming Jenkin, of the Edinburgh University, in 
a recent discourse delivered before a trades' council in 
Glasgow, argues the principle of apprenticeship. His 
impression is that the indenture system is practically 
dead ; and he declares for workshop instruction, for tech- 
nical training in the society, and that every lad of good 
character should be eligible ; that there should be a clas- 
sification of jobs and periodical examination of appren- 
tices. I take the following striking passage from an ac- 
count of the address : 

The pay of apprentices should be uniform, while ap- 
prentices should be registered, and the record of their regis- 
tration would be a certificate, not only of character and 
competency, but it might also be a high honor. He 
would have competitions between the apprentices in dif- 
ferent shops and towns, principally for honorary but also 
for substantial rewards, and the highest of these he would 
call traveling scholarships. The final sanction he should 
like to see applied would be that a lad who had gone 
through a definite course of that kind with credit should 
be received into a trades-union on better terms than those 
who had not received such an education. What he had 
sketched would be a real technical education that would 
make a man a good workman. 

Trade societies organized upon this plan would serve 
to raise a high tone of character by requiring a standard 
of education and moral worth as the only means of admis- 
sion ; and an adequate degree of skill and workmanship 
would be maintained by regulations made for the bene- 
fit of the society and of the community. The scheme 
might be rendered still more useful to all the members 
by occasional lectures upon the principles of science ap- 
pertaining to each particular industry. The plumbing 



APPRENTICESHIP AND THE TRADES-UNIONS. 183 

trade should have a course of scientific instniction on the 
subject of sanitary engineering; the building trades, on 
architectural drawing, and the principles governing the 
strength of materials, the solidity of walls, and the bearing 
of arches ; the dyer or calico-printer, on the leading prin- 
ciples of organic colors and how they become insoluble 
on textile fabrics ; and so on, with all the other voca- 
tions, where technical information would improve the 
knowledge and lead to a higher standard of excellence 
in w^orkmanship. The technical education of workmen 
ought to be provided for by themselves, for no other peo- 
ple can do it so well. In each workshop there should be 
a course of instruction. We have seen that the industrial 
classes can organize societies possessing intelligence and 
resources. Why can not they devise a scheme of educa- 
tion ? It would cost less and fare better than an unsuc- 
cessful strike, and would leave the whole subject of ap- 
prenticeship in their own hands. There is no way now 
existing by which the young artisan can become an effi- 
cient workman in the shortest time possible. And the 
time is near at hand when, if they provide no means of 
attaining that object, some scheme of education will be 
put in operation which will. But of this we will speak 
by-and-by. 

Just here let me observe that something approaching 
the plan here proposed has been tried during some years 
in England, under the name of the University Extension 
Scheme, which is fully delineated by a recent writer, who 
obtained his information at the Bureau of Education : 

In 1873 several of the large towns in England peti- 
tioned the University of Cambridge to supply them with 
courses of lectures on the subjects required for the uni- 



184 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

versitj degrees in arts, on condition tliat the requisite 
funds should be provided by the local authorities. 

In response to this application a syndicate was formed 
to consider and advise upon the matter. At its recom- 
mendation a system was proposed, under the name of the 
University Extension Scheme, and inaugurated. Classes 
were formed, and courses of lectures were delivered in 
1874-75 at different towns. The subjects of the lectures 
were political economy, the constitutional history of Eng- 
land, social history, English literature, logic, astronomy, 
light, spectrum analysis, geology, and physical geography. 
The courses were from three to six months in duration. 

The number of persons attending was 3,500, of whom 
984 were examined, 315 obtained first-class certificates, 
and 570 second-class. In 1876 thirty towns were visited, 
the attendance rose to 7,000, and 1,700 students present- 
ed themselves for examination. In 1877-78 courses of 
lectures were given at twenty-one centers, which were at- 
tended by upward of 10,000, out of which 1,088 presented 
themselves for examination. 

An endeavor is made to meet the requirements and 
circumstances of all classes of society. The courses of 
lectures which are given in the mornings and afternoons 
are mainly attended by the wealthier inhabitants of both 
sexes ; at the evening lectures working-men preponderate. 
A considerable number of elementary school-teachers at- 
tend in all the towns. 

The amount of the fees paid by the student is set- 
tled by the local committees. They range from Is. 6d. to 
£1 1^. for the complete course, but they very seldom ex- 
ceed 10^. In several centers the fees are quite suflicient 
to pay all the expenses. 

This interesting method of popularizing university 
education goes much further than is required for a man- 
ual and technical education by which the apprentice may 
gradually become an accomplished artisan, and may there- 



AMERICAN BOYS. 185 

fore serve the purpose of illustrating what might be at- 
tained with less effort by the same class in this country. 

We may, then, submit that the question of wages, the 
hours to constitute a day's labor, the exclusion of chil- 
dren until old enough, the admission of women to the 
trades, the protection of employes injured when engaged 
in a common employment, the duty of mutual assistance 
in periods of distress, and the manual and technical educa- 
tion of younger workmen, present relations about which 
each trade knows its own requirements ; and it is only by 
organization that they can explain and carry out their 
views and maintain their interests. But beyond this they 
have no moral right to set up close corporations for the 
purpose of preventing other competent persons from the 
exercise of industry in learning a trade. Besides, if our 
boys were trained systematically in the mechanic arts, 
trades would increase and industries multiply by their 
skill and ingenuity, yielding employment to our own peo- 
ple. But, instead of that, we are obliged to import hun- 
dreds of thousands of skilled artisans from abroad, while 
our American boys are roaming the streets in idleness. 
Most of them are willing to work, but find nothing to do, 
and are compelled to engage in any mean and subordinate 
employment that will afford a precarious support. The 
question is presented whether our trades are to be given 
up to foreigners, or taken by our own people. What are 
the boys to do ? We talk much of their fast ways, their 
vagrant habits, and their fearful tendency to vice, and we 
scold them, as if they alone were accountable for the bad- 
ly-ordered condition of their needs. Our failure to pro- 
vide suitable employment for them often leads to cases 
of open rebellion against parental restraint, for they will 



186 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

not generally act upon their own will unless left in idle- 
ness. Let us remember that thej cannot become carpen- 
ters, blacksmiths, silver and gold smiths, watch-makers, ma- 
sons, or printers, without opportunities of learning these 
occupations, and w-e have seen that they are refused ad- 
mission into the workshop. Our children are generally 
regarded as apt to prefer anything but work. It does not 
appear to be so among families where there is any effort 
at a respectable life. On the contrary, upon attaining 
the proper age, it will be found that boys are generally 
anxious to work, and especially to learn some industrial 
art. But the doors of the remunerative trades are closed 
upon them, and the cities are gradually filling up with 
an unskilled populace deprived of the means of physical 
prosperity. The scriptural injunction, " Train up a child 
in the way he should go," is ignored as to the boys of the 
street, w^ho are not trained at all, or only in their natu- 
ral predispositions of idleness and vice, from which they 
do not depart in their manhood. The bad boy is apt to 
make the bad man. He grows up without any promise 
of usefulness, and will likely develop into the tramp or 
criminal. Boys who are allowed to spend their time in 
idleness contract vicious habits, and only in rare instances 
become honest men. The chances are that they will gradu- 
ate from the street without respect for either God or man, 
and their theoretical information, if they have any, will be 
drawn from reading the pernicious literature of the day, 
whose corrupting influence is realized in their daily life. 
Their pride to earn a living and achieve an honorable posi- 
tion is gone, because there is nothing for them to do. Their 
want of employment is enforced. They are cut off from a 
hfe of useful activity, for, when the trades are practically 



AMERICAN BOYS. 187 

closed to our boys, there is scarcely any other path left 
open for a career of industry. They cannot be expected to 
fit themselves for skilled work, when the workshops will 
only receive the few to whom that favor is extended by 
the rules of the societies. They instinctively turn from 
digging and shoveling — for tliere are few young men with 
the supreme energy of the late George Law, who com- 
menced life by carrying a hod — so that there are really no 
means of employment left to lure our youth from idleness 
or to excite their enterprise and ambition. To be brought 
up as errand-boys and messengers, or to hawk newspa- 
pers, vend pea-nuts, or even carry the hod, are not fitting 
employments for American boys. If you doubt their 
willingness to work, advertise that a boy is wanted in an 
office or a workshop, and there will be hundreds of ap- 
plications within the same day ; and your heart will ache 
at the pleading supplications of the mothers and sisters 
and other relatives, each with a boy for the vacant place. 
An editor recently inserted such an advertisement in his 
paper ; and he writes that he was overwhelmed with ap- 
plicants, and that they pleaded only as those struggling 
with grim poverty can plead, and the struggle with hu- 
man pride and gaunt want was such as ought to move the 
stoutest heart to pity. The anxious and inquiring look 
of the young boys as they simply pleaded for work, the 
strained attention with which they listened to the reply 
which was to make them supremely happy or crush their 
young hopes with heavy disappointment, were most pain- 
ful to behold. 

It is often said that these boys do not attend the pub- 
lic schools. This, however, is far from being true ; but 
they either stray away, from a disinclination to study, or 



188 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

have learned no useful work by which they can earn a 
living, and so lapse into idleness and vice. Even among 
those who go through the regular course of studies we 
find the same fruitless search for something or anything 
to do. They flock to the cities, to become shopmen or 
agents of some kind. They are mostly clever, and can 
turn their hands to almost anything but honest work. A 
Philadelphia merchant advertised for a book-keeper, and in 
a few hours received six hundred and seventy-three appli- 
cants, nearly all of whom asked a compensation that would 
not exceed two thirds of the wages of a skilled artisan ; and 
upon that they stniggle to maintain a shabby-genteel exist- 
ence. They are well educated as things go, and scorn to 
work by hand, and, poor as they are, they would rather 
beg and fawn for any kind of a job to employ the brain, 
but not the hand ! A good mechanic has seldom occasion 
to advertise for employment. He thoroughly understands 
the enjoyment of independence, for his skill is in demand, 
and he can almost dictate his own terms. He, moreover, 
belongs to a class that is increasing in numbers, intelligence, 
influence, and social position ; and which has the advantage 
of organizing into associations for the management of their 
own interests and protection. This is infinitely prefer- 
able to the shabby-genteel element in society, that is con- 
stantly crowding for situations of every description, ex- 
cept those dependent upon hand-work. To such mis- 
guided youths I commend the following excellent remarks 
of James Parton, the well-known writer : 

Compare the mechanics in the Kovelty Works with 
the clerks in Stewart's store. The clerks are excellent 
fellows ; they look well, dress well, understand their busi- 
ness, and are in every res2:)ect worthy members of society ; 



AMERiaVN BOYS. 189 

but our best mechanics have a certain force of manhood, 
a weight of character, and depth of reflection, rarely seen 
in those who only buy and sell. 

I should be sorry to say anything to disparage our in- 
stitutions of learning. Nevertheless, I feel confident that 
an intelligent youth who remains at school until he is 
sixteen or seventeen, and then apprentices to a good trade, 
can get a better education out of his shop (with an hour's 
study of principles in the evening) than it is possible to 
get in any college in existence — that is to say, a better 
education for this new and forming country, where, for 
fifty years at least to come, no man can hope to play a 
leading part, except in wielding material forces. 

I say, then, lads of sixteen, if you would lay a founda- 
tion for sure prosperity, begin by learning a trade. If 
you would escape the perdition of being a fool, learn a 
trade. If you would do a man's part for your country, 
begin the work of preparation by learning a trade. 

Since the practical extinction of the apprenticeship 
system, there is no remedy but the industrial school, 
which will teach the useful in human labor, and where 
the pupils will cease to look down upon mechanical 
skill as an inferior or degrading pursuit. The won- 
derful additions to our knowledge, almost within the 
memory of our own generation, offer the noblest field for 
the employment of our young men. We have discovered 
numberless forms of applied science, and many more are 
at this moment on the verge of our horizon. Instead of 
shoveling grain by hand, there is the huge elevator which 
loads and unloads immense cargoes for all the populous 
marts of the world ; and our railroads, telegraphs, tele- 
phones, and electric lights, reveal new realms of discov- 
ery. The merely literary education of the public school 
must be combined with the practice of manual art, for 



190 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

this union will be invested with new and amazing func- 
tions, and the young men will become skilled in what 
may be necessary to carry forward the economic develop- 
ments of all our industries. In these pursuits, the great- 
est triumphs of the world are hereafter to be attained ; 
and any one with ambition and mechanical ability of any 
sort should not hesitate to select some useful pursuit, for 
of such will b3 the inventors and successful men of the 
future. 

If the commercial cities are crowded with young men 
who have no higher ambition than to obtain a clerkship, 
how much larger must the number be here in Washing- 
ton, where the compensation for mere clerical labor is the 
maximum ! They swarm in duplicated thousands, a bur- 
den to themselves and a constant trial to their friends. 
This condition of affairs does not arise because there is 
nothing to do. In every branch of skilled industry there 
is an active demand for good workmen. In consequence 
of the scarcity of competent artisans, much work has to 
be postponed, so that while the poor boy, who is not per- 
mitted to learn a trade, and the well-educated graduate, 
are going about begging, hat in hand, for a place, me- 
chanical and artistic skill are far above par, and possess 
the supreme consciousness of knowing that they have 
produced more than the worth of what they have re- 
ceived. This unnatural condition could not exist if our 
youth were taught the use of tools ; and the avenues of 
mere clerical labor would not be crowded by jostling 
thousands who have lived to regret in want and bitter- 
ness that they have no trade, and who are now beginning 
to learn that there is independence in honest work and 
true manhood in manual industry. 



AMERICAN BOYS. 191 

The ambition of parents to have their children rise 
in the world comes from an affectionate interest in their 
welfare. They are apt to think that mechanical industry 
is demeaning. This false idea corrupts the children, and 
drives untold thousands into all sorts of pursuits where 
they have little chance of either usefulness or happiness. 
Children are born with certain aptitudes. This is equally 
true of the artisan as of the poet, and, if properly trained, 
they insure success and an honorable career. A child 
ought to be taught that for which he has a natural bent, 
and in which he can do the best for himself, and thus in- 
sure a permanent habit of industry suited to his abilities. 

An appeal is made to all parents to bring their com- 
mon sense to bear upon this subject, and to discard all 
false ideas in regard to honest work. Heaven has given 
you children, and you should bring them up to be useful 
members of society. Are you aware that the neglect of 
this solemn duty makes you responsible for their errors, 
and for the misery and unhappiness they may suffer ? 
When boys are permitted to roam about the streets of a 
large city, they soon become acquainted with low, vulgar, 
and vicious habits, and they will be found at the places 
of public resorts, using profanity and slang, and quite 
likely making disturbances. They are out late at night, 
rioting in the company of the abandoned, and improv- 
ing more and more in the practice of vice, and the art of 
going to the penitentiary. The parent who permits this 
is an accomplice in the crime of his son, which might 
have been prevented by an exercise of parental authority. 
Hundreds of young men and boys furnish lamentable 
proofs of this evil tendency. Many respectable parents 
acknowledge that their boys are wild, but declare that 



192 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

they cannot help it, when really they have only them- 
selves to blame for the want of power over their chil- 
dren. Youth need correction, because prone to evil, 
and, above all things, require some steady discipline, 
either of work or study, or of both at once, to niake them 
mindful of their duty, and to convince them that atten- 
tion to something useful is far more attractive than rev- 
elry, dissipation, and idleness. It is safe to say that the 
principal cause of the enormous increase of vice and pau- 
perism may be found in the careless and wicked manner 
in which children are now trained, or rather in the want 
of any training at all. As soon as a boy reaches ten or 
fifteen years of age, and is put to no useful pursuit or 
study, he is very apt to fancy himself a man, and he be- 
lieves the best proof of his being a man consists in disre- 
garding parental admonitions, in pursuing his own way, 
and keeping his own company, and he then travels with 
wonderful rapidity toward the domain of want and per- 
haps infamy. Hence the streets swarm with idlers and 
loafers of high and low degree. These facts stare every 
one in the face, without causing us to reflect that these 
street Arabs do not make their own tempers and surround- 
ings, but inherit them by their birth and the examples at 
home. A child was asked what boys were good for, and 
replied, " To make men of " ; so each one of these vagrants 
is capable of being made a good man. The lucidity of a 
gem is not apparent until it is polished. It is the same 
with character. However low in estate it may appear, 
care and cultivation can raise it above its condition and 
make it grand and beautiful. We should remember that 
our offspring 'inherit not only our lineaments but our 
moral nature, and that our example may elevate or mod- 



MORAL INFLUENCE OF INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS. I93 

if J their life and character. A wealthy merchant recently 
made a sagacious remark, viz., that he was going to have 
all his sous learn a trade of some kind, so' that they should 
have something to fall back upon, in case adversity or 
misfortune ever overtook them in the business he should 
leave them. So every father who would restrain his son 
from entering the habitation of vice, who would correct 
him when correction was salutary, who would insist upon 
his attention to moral and religious improvement, and 
who would teach him to be generous and upright, must, 
in addition to all these, insist that education shall include 
practical lessons in some useful art or trade. Until this 
reformation in teaching the young takes place, the poor 
workman and the poor boy will swell the increasing ranks 
of poverty and turbulence. 

This remedy is suggested, not only upon a theory 
which seems reasonable in itself, but also upon the distinct 
ground of experience in nearly every country on the Con- 
tinent of Europe. The French Imperial Commission, ap- 
pointed June 22, 1863, to inquire into the character of 
technical instruction throughout France, speaking of the 
moral and intellectual effects of the apprentice-schools in 
Belgium, declare that the pupils in those workshops learn 
reading, writing, the rudiments of arithmetic, etc., almost 
as rapidly as those who are obliged to remain in school all 
day ; and that experience has proved that the introduc- 
tion of literary and moral instruction is effected with 
the greatest facility in the workshops, and that it pro- 
duces an excellent effect on the character and morals of 
the young workmen. At that date fifty-four apprentice- 
schools had been established in the kingdom, in most of 
which primary instruction was given to the extent desired, 



194 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

and the number of workmen thej had turned out in a 
period of twelve years for a single industry, that of weav- 
ing, amounted to 13,481 — the greater part rescued from 
want, mendicity, and all the vices they engender. The 
same report also says that " the official reports published 
at Bruges, in 1863, show that everywhere instruction and 
habits of regular employment have produced the most 
successful results in improving the morals not only of the 
children, but also of the parents, and that mendicity and 
vagrancy have almost entirely disappeared from those dis- 
tricts " where the apprentice-schools are established. 

All must admit that these observations agree with 
the experience of every community where the youth are 
educated and brought up to steady employment. It pro- 
ceeds upon the theory that they should receive such in- 
struction as would enable them to enter upon some useful 
pursuit, and at the same time give them an opportunity 
to acquire a general education, so that they will turn out 
to be good workmen and intelligent social beings. This 
is the need of this nation. Industrial education is our 
notorious want. A thousand things combine to mold the 
institutions of a people. Commerce, climate, the attrac- 
tion of novel inventions, the love of imitation, and the 
vicissitudes of war — all contribute to national character. 
But the ornamentation of human existence will hereafter 
evolve the most important additions to human wealth and 
advancement ; and Art-Industry, that waxing giant of the 
future, is already at the doors of our educational system, 
knocking for admission, and promising, not only to fur- 
nish skill to our labor, but to elevate our taste, and embel- 
lish our ordinary existence with its cheerful and refining 
influence. I know there is a sentimental prejudice which 



MORAL INFLUENCE OF INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS. 195 

considers that it mars the high claims and moral influence 
of truth and knowledge to measure them by their power 
of administering to some useful purpose. We should love 
truth for its own sake undoubtedly, but we should also 
remember that there is no truth worthy of our considera- 
tion which will not benefit mankind. Hence it is that in 
every effort to diffuse popular knowledge or particular 
instruction, and in every application of science to the use- 
ful arts, genius and learning often And their most impor- 
tant and interesting employment. Attainments in knowl- 
edge are often supposed by the ignorant to be of no real im- 
portance, and are frequently ridiculed as being barren of 
all practical utility. But nothing could be more mistaken 
than this. There is no branch of industrial art which 
does not owe, for the most part, its improved processes to 
a discovery of the laws of nature ; and the most useful 
inventions and improvements have resulted from scientific 
research. And so art, industry, virtue, knowledge, benefi- 
cence, fidelity to principle — all in their places — contrib- 
ute to the wealth, permanence, and prosperity of a na- 
tion. 



CHAPTEE XL 

Education of young artisans — Apprenticeship — English legislation — Mr. 
Jevons's views — Adam Smith's opinion — Practically no apprenticeship 
in the United States — Teclmological schools in Europe — Trade-schools in 
Germany — Established by law — Supported by the state or local author- 
ities — The school at Hamburg — Trade-schools the most interesting — 
The one at Barmen — Drawing in all the German schools — The school 
at Chemnitz — Schools at Vienna — Technical education in Switzerland 
— The great benefits thereof to that country — Opinion of the French 
minister in that country — The first industrial school founded there by 
Pestalozzi — These institutions in France — After the Crystal Palace 
Exposition — A commission appointed — Important changes — Classifica- 
tion of industrial schools by Professor Thompson — Impossible to exem- 
plify them separately — j^cole municipal d' apprentis — Account of the same 
— Visit of British Commission to the same — French industrial schools not 
national — ^cole Saint-Nicolas — School at Roubaix — Government support 
within two years — The republican government established a national 
system recently — Schools in Belgium — Those at Ghent, Tournay, 
Verviers, and the cities — Apprentice-school for weaving — Technical 
education in Great Britain — Letter of the Chancellor — Views of Mr. 
McLaren — ^Report of the British Commission — Questions which arise 
as to effect in Europe — Is it suitable for the United States ? — Universal 
opinion in its favor — Report of the British Commission — French commis- 
sion of inspection — School la Villeiie — Corbon, senator, upon the same — 
Tolain, senator, on apprenticeship-schools — Industrial training the neces- 
sity of the age — Good effect on the industrial classes — Opinion on this 
subject — Views of educators in the United States — Shall it be in the 
public school ? — Different views entertained — Dr. E. E. White — John 
E. Clarke — The necessity of this instruction admitted. 

Anything relating to the subject of industry ought to 
be treated as worthy of fair and deliberate attention by 



APPRENTICESHIP. I97 

the American people. The manner of educating youth- 
ful artisans presents a topic of immense interest, and it is 
impossible for us, conscious of our great industrial power, 
to neglect much longer proper measures for industrial 
training which will be both practical and potential. For- 
merly, by the statute law of England, an apprenticeship of 
seven yeai-s was recognized as the legal mode of entering 
a trade, but at the beginning of the present century Parlia- 
ment repealed all legislation upon the subject. In a work 
entitled " The State in Relation to Labor," Mr. Jevons, a 
brilliant writer on political economy, complains of the 
practice of binding youths to long periods of apprentice- 
ship, and notes with much earnestness that it has fallen 
into desuetude, and discusses the common law still in 
force, which allows a parent to bind a child to a long term 
of industrial servitude ; and he thinks it to be a question 
whether it ought not also to be abolished. He confirms 
his own views by a well-known passage from Adam Smith 
(" Wealth of Nations," vol. i, p. 110) in which that great 
author uses the following language : 

The institution of long apprenticeship has no tend- 
ency to form young people to industry. A journeyman 
who works by the piece is likely to be industrious, be- 
cause he derives a benefit from every exertion of his in- 
dustry. An apprentice is likely to be idle, and almost 
always is so, because he has no immediate interest to be 
otherwise. ... A young man naturally conceives an aver- 
sion to labor, when for a long time he receives no benefit 
from it. ... A young man would practice with much 
more diligence and attention, if from the beginning he 
wrought as a journeyman, being paid in proportion to the 
little work which he could execute, and paying in his turn 
for the materials which he might sometimes spoil through 



198 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

awkwardness and inexperience. His education would in 
this way be more effectual, and always less tedious and 
expensive. 

Ko other mode of learning an industry is suggested 
or prescribed by these authors, unless it be to limit the 
term to a less number of years, and to pay the apprentice 
for what work he executes. In the United States it can 
scarcely be said that there is any mode of acquiring a 
trade, except that the boys admitted into the shops or 
factories pick up their knowledge from seeing the man- 
ual work of others. There is no one responsible for their 
instruction ; and of technical education there is none at 
all. Hence we stand beneath every other civilized nation 
in the productions of art-industry ; and yet there is no 
nation where there is a greater demand for iirst-class 
articles. Technical education in our workshops has no 
existence; and, as this want is not supplied by the trade- 
societies, it must be provided for outside of them ; for 
this country cannot afford to draw its skilled labor from 
other countries, and allow its own people to drift upon 
circumstances as the only available resource of sustenance. 
The technological schools of Europe are very numerous, 
especially in France, Germany, Austria, and Switzerland ; 
and they are generally equipped with machinery and 
workshops for teaching thoroughly and systematically the 
actual work required in the various trades and the arts con- 
nected with them ; and their pupils learn to become civil 
engineers, foremen in commercial and industrial establish- 
ments, and skilled in a variety of mechanical operations. 
Inferior to these great institutions, lesser schools are 
found in various parts of Europe to assist in the educa- 
tion of the apprentice. 



INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS IN EUROPE 199 

The Gewerbe Bchiden^ or trade-schools, in Germany 
are very numerous, and constitute a harmonious branch 
in the general system of public education. Elementary 
schools appear to be graded into lower and higher, and 
attendance is compulsory in the former until the age of 
fourteen. Other schools are then provided by the state, 
according to the pursuits which the children are to take in 
after-life. The Real Schule leads to the polytechnic 
school, and the Gymnasiiim to the university, and the 
Gewerhe Schulen^ or trade-schools, are designed for those 
pupils who intend to follow industry. The children are 
admitted into the trade-schools from the elementary 
schools, and are fitted for their respective occupations in 
the completest manner ]3ossible with the conditions of the 
school ; and the best pupils are allowed to pass into the 
higher institutions, where a technical education is given 
in all kinds of applied science. 

The trade-schools are established by law, and support- 
ed by the state, and sometimes also by the local authori- 
ties where they are situated. As, for instance, the city 
of Hamburg, in 1874, voted $600,000 for a building to 
accommodate a " General Industrial School, and a School 
for Building-Mechanics." This was also the case with 
the schools of Griinberg, Miilheim, Chemnitz, Crefeld, 
and several other places. There are also schools that re- 
ceive no aid from the state, and which are established by 
societies of manufacturers for the improvement of their 
fabrics. JS'one of these schools are supported by private 
liberality. The state does all, except where the local 
municipalities bear a portion of the expense. 

Mr. McLaren, during a journey through Germany in 
1878, learned many facts concerning its educational sys- 



200 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

tem, and, after stating how education is divided and clas- 
sified, remarks that the most interesting of the ordinary 
German schools are these trade-schools for boys who in- 
tend to follow some business where scientific knowledge 
is necessary or desirable. One of the most complete is at 
Barmen, in Ehenish Prussia. The curriculum comprises 
twenty-two studies, and among them are algebra, geom- 
etry, higher mathematics, mensuration and land-survey- 
ing, building construction, natural philosophy, mechanics, 
chemistry with work in a laboratory, mineralogy, botany, 
drawing, writing, and singing. Each scholar chooses those 
subjects which are likely to be useful to him in after-life, 
and with such a large variety it is plain that almost every 
trade must be more or less represented. In all German 
schools drawing is considered of great importance, both 
on account of the pleasure it gives, and its refining influ- 
ence upon the mind, and on account of its great use in 
all manufacturing trades. At this school there were 
about 350 day-scholars, and for the benefit of the artisan 
population whose children have to work during the day- 
time, there are evening-classes which are largely attended, 
and for which the fee is about seventy-five cents a half 
year. The school at Barmen was erected at a cost of 
£15,000, and the one at Elberfeld, which joins Barmen, 
at a cost of £20,000. At Chemnitz, the chief manufact- 
uring town of Saxony, a magnificent trade-school has been 
built, costing £60,000, to accommodate 600 scholars; 
and connected with it there is a professor whose sole duty 
it is to travel about and make drawings of new machines 
of every description, belonging to all industries, which 
are afterward used by the students of machine-construc- 
tion and engineering. They have also a museum for 



INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS IN EUROPE. 201 

models of machinery ; and, in addition to this, the gov- 
ernment sends the professors, free of expense, to England 
or any other country, where they can see things that will 
be of use to them in their work. With such a system 
there is no wonder that Germany possesses a large num- 
ber both of skilled and scientific workmen and masters, 
who come to their work with minds thoroughly trained 
to appropriate and adopt all the improvements which sci- 
ence can suggest. 

Mr. McLaren also found in Vienna several such schools, 
one of which, for eight hundred scholars, cost between 
£60,000 and £70,000, and he finds it impossible to describe 
the admirable arrangements and course of instruction at 
these schools. They are, as in Germany, largely support- 
ed by the State and the municipality, for the fees, which are 
three or four pounds a year, are quite insufficient to pay 
their expenses. In Vienna, the schools are very well attend- 
ed at night by workmen and apprentices ; for there is a law 
which obliges apprentices to attend a night-school during 
part of their apprenticeship. They learn chemistry, natu- 
ral philosophy, geometry, drawing, modeling, etc. We 
see the result of this system in the immense manufacture 
of beautiful fancy articles of every description which is 
carried on in that city. Besides these, there are at least 
eighty schools in Austria for industrial training. 

In respect to technical education, Switzerland has per- 
haps gone as far as any of her neighbors. Elementary 
instruction is compulsory until the age of twelve, and is 
carried on, in a most thorough manner, in accordance with 
the principles inculcated by Pestalozzi ; and which are 
now so widely imitated in Great Britain and the United 
States. At the age of twelve the boys can go to the 

10 



202 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

gymnasium if they wish to follow a literary career, and 
from there to the university. But, if they wish to have 
a scientific or commercial education, they can go to the 
secondary school, then to the industrial, and, at last, to 
the polytechnic. Of course, the great mass of children 
can not afford the time for these courses, and for them the 
state provides a lower sort of technical school where for 
a year or two they can learn the sciences best suited to 
the trade they intend to follow. 

Perhaps with the exception of Scotland, the intimate 
dependence of industrial progress upon educational prog- 
ress has been nowhere more apparent than in this small 
and sterile country. Says a French minister in Switzer- 
land : " From among these sterile rocks, there is exported 
every year an amount of products sufficient to pay for all 
the importations made, and more especially for the two 
hundred million francs' worth of goods which France 
alone sells to that people, which in former times cultivated 
mercenary warfare as its sole branch of industry ; and 
the country produces, besides, so many skillful men that 
in every commercial city of the world a Swiss colony is 
found holding the first rank ; and in almost every great 
commercial house may be found intelligent clerks who 
have come from Basle, Zurich, or Neufchatel." 

It is a pleasing coincidence that the rugged land about 
which these gracious statements are made was the first to 
give an example of industrial, teaching, for, going as far 
back as 1775, that distinguished reformer in methods of 
teaching, Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi, himself a native 
of Switzerland, founded at ^Neuhof a model industrial 
school for poor children, and for a period of five years 
devoted his energy, his time, and his fortune to teaching 



INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS IN EUROPE. 203 

and training fifty boys in practical knowledge of various 
industries. That was the beginning not only of the nu- 
merous industrial schools now in the world, but also of 
that profound revolution in elementary teaching which 
substituted the science of things for their symbols. 

The importance of these institutions was not prac- 
tically recognized in France until long after they had 
been tested, in other countries. The first impulse they 
received was probably owing to the competition growing 
out of the Crystal Palace Exposition, where Great Britain 
saw herself behind other nations in the artistic effects of 
her industry, and when she promptly commenced that 
energetic career of reform in art-education which soon 
carried her work to the front rank among her rivals in 
the subsequent expositions. The leadership of France in 
the department of industrial art was seriously threatened, 
and disregarding for the moment the assumed superior- 
ity of her artistic traditions, a commission was appoint- 
ed which was for a long time engaged in ascertaining 
what had been done among her neighbors for the tech- 
nical training and industrial education of skilled artisans. 
They collected a mass of evidence upon the subject, and 
among other topics made a strong report in favor of ap- 
prenticeship-schools. This was followed not only by 
important changes in her great technical institutions, 
but several lesser schools sprang up to give instruction in 
the manual processes of art to her workmen. The most 
important of these institutions have been classified by a 
recent writer under three heads, viz. : 

1. Schools which profess to give a training sufficient 
to qualify the pupil to enter a factory forthwith as a 
skilled workman, or apprenticeship-schools proper. 



204 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

2. Scliook wliich prepare pupils for subsequent ap- 
prenticeship bj giving them some manual and technical 
instruction along with an ordinary schooling, or schools 
preparatory to apprenticeship. 

8. Institutions for giving technical instruction to the 
apprentices of a regular factory or workshop, or to the 
apprentices of some particular industry. 

All these, however they may differ in form, are in- 
dustrial schools, and are to be found in the principal 
cities, especially Paris, Havre, Douai, Chalons, Lyons, 
Aix, and Besangon, and are meant to train boys to become 
good workmen in wood, in building, and in metal trades ; 
i. e., carpenters, cabinet-makers, pattern-makers, smiths, 
fitters, turners, locksmiths, watch-makers, silversmiths, 
and in weaving the beautiful fabrics of silk. They are 
principally supported by their respective localities, and 
in most of them instruction is free. 

Those in and near Paris are of every diversity and 
character, but in all of them systematic training in the 
handicrafts is deemed an essential part of education ; this 
is, however, accompanied by elementary and technical in- 
struction throughout the whole period of study. Indeed, 
the number of these schools in France, although of re- 
cent origin, is very great ; and it would be almost impos- 
sible to exemplify them separately, on account of their 
variety and different forms of organization. I will, how- 
ever, as a type of many others established in Paris, men- 
tion that of the tlcole Municipal d* Apprentis. It has 
often been described. It was founded at the expense of 
the city, and began its work in 1872. I am tempted to 
give an account of it, from an address by Professor 
Thompson, who examined it most carefully in person, 



INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS IN EUROPE. 205 

and described it only after having visited it seven several 
times for tliat purpose. He sajs : 

The ilcole d^ ApjprenUs of Paris, situated in the Boule- 
vard de ]a Yillette, is a school of similar character, but 
surpasses the Havre school in size, in the extent of its 
appliances, and in the general superiority of its organiza- 
tion. The results attained by this school are truly strik- 
ing. No pupil is admitted before thirteen, nor without 
his certificate of elementary education. The course of 
instruction lasts three years, about half the day being 
given to schooling, and half to practical work in one or 
other of the workshops. The lads who go out at sixteen 
or seventeen, are able at once to rank as skilled workmen, 
earning a wage usually only obtained by those who have 
served a much longer apprenticeship in the shops, and in 
some cases to earn higher wages than the average skilled 
workman who is of age. Happily, the promoters of this 
school have viewed the experiment in a truly scientific 
spirit, and the exact data w^hich they have kept upon all 
statistical matters enable a precise estimate to be drawn 
of the signal success attained by the school. The school 
was founded in 1873. Of seventy-four apprentices who had 
gone out up to August, 1877, sixty-nine remained faith- 
ful up to the present year in the industry taught them in 
the school ; and their average rate of payment on leaving 
had been equivalent to eighteen shillings a week, reckon- 
ing fifty- six hours to the week's work ; their average age 
on leaving being seventeen and a half. Some of these, 
the young smiths and metal-turners, earn more than this, 
and receive from twenty up to thirty and even thirty- 
two shillings a week, as soon as they go out to work. 
Now, this school is one where there is a graded series of 
manual exercises, where those exercises are undertaken 
solely to develop the pupils' skill without reference to 
their commercial profitableness, where no work may be 
attempted until the how and why have been explained, nor 
until the piece of work has been made the subject of a 



206 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

proper working drawing. It is a school where regular, 
systematic, technical, and scientific principles are both in- 
stilled in class and insisted upon in the workshops. The 
instruction is not left to uninstructed workmen, but is in 
the hands of competent teachers, the head of the work- 
shop staff, for example, being himself a former pupil of 
one of the Ecoles des Arts et Metiers, and thoroughly 
imbued with the scientific spirit, while the teacher of 
physics is an accomplished assistant in the Paris Observa- 
tory. The director, M. Miiller, is himself animated with 
the spirit of the institution, and conducts excellent classes 
in descriptive geometry and other subjects. M. Bocquet, 
the superintendent of the workshops, gives a course of 
technological lessons, which, beginning with descriptions 
of tools and bits of machinery, bolts, nuts, keys, etc., 
leads up to a complete knowledge of machinery and of 
machine tools. Drawing, applied physics, applied chem- 
istry, algebra, arithmetic, geometry, and even industrial 
jurisprudence, form parts of the curriculum of studies. 
To visit this school and its workshops — and I have vis- 
ited it seven times, and spent many hours within its pre- 
cincts — is sufficient to dispel the notion that the rational 
scientific apprenticeship advocated here, and in my 
pamphlet on '' Apprenticeship Schools," is an impossible 
or Utopian idea, incapable of existing anywhere except 
on paper. The problem is solved ; and it is now simply 
a question of cost how far this solution can be applied. 
The small collection of studies executed by the pupils of 
this school, which I am able — thanks to the kind co-op- 
eration of Dr. Miiller and of M. Bocquet — to exhibit to- 
night, will give but a faint idea of the works undertaken 
by the pupils. 

This celebrated school was again visited in the early 
part of the year 1882 by the British Eoyal Commission, 
to inquire into the technical education of the industrial 
classes on the continent, and in their report they say that 



INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS IN EUROPE. 207 

the number attending the school has been constantly 
increasing. In January, 1873, it had only seventeen 
scholars. On May 1st, in the same year, the number was 
sixty -four ; last year it was two hundred and fifty, of 
whom one hundred and seven were of the first year, 
eighty-one of the second, and sixty-two of the third year ; 
and that the boys who were in the school last year in 
their second and third years were distributed among the 
two trades w^hich in Paris command the highest wages ; 
and that the boys on leaving school, with very few ex- 
ceptions, earn wages varying from 2^. Qd. to 5^. Q)d. per 
day. 

They also refer to the circumstance that the authori- 
ties of the city of Paris have deemed the experiment of 
apprenticeship-teaching in the school of La Yillette suffi- 
ciently successful to induce them to decide upon the 
erection of a number of other similar schools in various 
parts of the metropolis, and that they have voted 80,000 
francs for that purpose. 

But we will not now anticipate what we intend to 
say in a subsequent chapter on the subject of this report. 
The French industrial schools do not, as in Belgium, 
Austria, and Germany, constitute a part of a national 
system of education, beginning with elementary instruc- 
tion, and afterward admitting the pupils at the proper 
age into the industrial schools, and from thence into the 
technological seminaries and the universities. On the 
contrary, they either are supported by the municipalities, 
like those of Paris and Lyons, or by business firms like 
MM. Chaix & Cie ; or else they are made self-supporting 
through the fees and board of the pupils, like the £]oole 
St. Nicolas, in the Rue de Yaugirard, conducted by an 



208 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

educational association under the auspices of the Christian 
Brothers. The schools of this association, including the 
brandies, contain upward of twenty-four hundred pupils. 
The school in the Kue de Yaugirard alone has seven 
hundred and twenty ordinary scholars and two hundred 
and fifty apprentices, all of whom are boarders. They 
pay an entrance fee of about ten dollars, and about one 
hundred dollars per annum for their board and tuition. 

The apprentice -boys receive instruction from the 
Christian Brothers for two hours daily, w^hich comprises 
not only the ordinary school lessons, but also teaching in 
drawing, modeling, and other appropriate subjects. The 
following trades are taught: Book-binding, optical and 
mathematical instrument making, type-setting, printing, 
working and chasing in bronze, brass instrument making, 
gilding, joiners' work, saddle-making, wood-carving, wood- 
engraving, map-engraving, and engine-fitting. The ap- 
prentices appear to be well taught, and find employment 
readily after they have left the workshops at wages, it is 
said, varying from five to even as much as eight francs 
per day. 

An instance is given by a recent tourist, who visited 
the north of France in the summer of 18Y9, of how a 
school of this description is built at the public expense. 
He visited the town of Eoubaix, which is very largely 
engaged in the manufacture of fine worsted goods. Hear- 
ing that a weaving-school had been opened there, he 
went to see it, and found a small but well-furnished 
school. The town council, which was composed of the 
chief manufacturers of the place, had built it for the 
benefit of the trade, and at the expense of the town. 
There was a day class with a fee of £16 a year, but in- 
struction in the evening was free. 



INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS IN EUROPE. 209 

This is probably a fair example of how schools are 
built, and, although it may not be the best way, it is un- 
doubtedly a good way, in so far as it provides much better 
schools than could be built by private subscription, and 
much better than when the whole subject is left, as with 
us, to those who take no interest in it. 

The Government of France long ago founded poly- 
technic schools, schools of design, and of drawing and 
architecture, great engineering and military schools, 
but it was not until within two or three years that she 
established industrial schools for training the intelli- 
gence of its ingenious people. That of Limoges has al- 
ready been mentioned, and there is the watch-making 
school at Cluses, to take the place of the municipal school 
for the same trade at Besan§on, which has also been de- 
scribed. To the republican government of France be- 
longs the honor of accomplishing more for the industrial 
education of its artisans than all the governments that 
preceded it. It has recently established a national system 
for the diffusion of education to all classes, and it has 
displayed its devotion to the interests of labor by decree- 
ing that manual training shall constitute a leading feature 
in the programmes of instruction. 

The relation of education to industry has been no- 
where more clearly demonstrated than in the beautiful 
little kingdom of Belgium. Since its establishment in 
1848, the government has evinced the most thorough 
regard for the technical training of the industrial classes. 
!N'umerous institutions are established for the instruction 
of artisans in designing, and in all the arts connected with 
industry. The school at Ghent has programmes of study 
suitable for the iron, cotton, hardware, bronze, and crystal 



210 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

manufactures, and also for those engaged in the making 
of chemicals, armor, mathematical and surgical instru- 
ments, and there are courses of mechanical drawing, 
chemistry, natural philosophy, and engineering. In 1881 
there were nine hundred scholars. A similar school at 
Tournay is equipped with a workshop " for the construc- 
tion of looms, mechanical lock-making, and for iron and 
copper founding and molding." There is also one at 
Yerviers devoted to weaving, dyeing, and chemistry, 
while in each of the cities of Antwerp, Ostend, Bruges, 
Liege, Soignies, Charleroi, and in numerous other towns 
throughout the whole country, these schools are established, 
in each case suited to the trade of the place. At the end 
of the year 1878 they numbered not less than two hun- 
dred and twenty, and the pupils 26,736. They were all 
subsidized by the government, or supported by their re- 
spective municipalities. 

In addition to these, there were fifty or sixty appren- 
ticeship-schools spread over as many communes, adapted 
to the special industry of weaving, and they send forth 
w^orkmen educated intellectually as well as in the prepa- 
ration of materials, the execution of patterns, and the 
comprehension and deciphering of designs for the most 
beautiful productions of the loom, and in all the econ- 
omies of the weaver's art. 

We may learn how warmly exercised is the public 
mind of Great Britain on the subject of technical educa- 
tion in its bearing upon the manufactures of that country 
from a recent letter (1881) of the Lord High Chancellor 
making an appeal for increased support of industrial in- 
struction in the London Institute. He is chairman of 
the guilds of that city, and he did not deem it deroga- 



INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS IN EUROPE. 211 

tor J to his high position to address a letter to the citj 
companies asking additional means to enable that institu- 
tion to insure still greater proficiency among its pupils. 
He states that technological examinations were con- 
ducted in no less than thirty-two different industries 
that had been held up to that time in eighty-five dif- 
ferent localities. These examinations have been very 
successful, and took place among the vaiious indus- 
trial populations of the United Kingdom. He also de- 
clares that it can no longer be denied that, in many 
instances, foreign manufacturers are competing with 
those of Britain to an extent that drives English prod- 
ucts from continental markets, and even successfully 
rivals them in the United Kingdom itself; and, as a 
remedy for this, he urges that provision be made for 
imparting a complete technical education in all parts of 
the country. 

The same views were very strongly expressed by Mr. 
Walter S. B. McLaren in a lecture before the Watts Institu- 
tion, Edinburgh, in 1879. In commencing, he said : " At 
the present time, when trade is worse than it has been for 
more than a generation ; when capitalists are becoming 
poorer instead of richer; when workmen are receiving 
low wages, and are pinched for the necessities of life ; 
when our exports are going down, and our imports are 
going up ; when foreign competition presses upon us as 
it never did before ; when foreign workmen can rival and 
excel us in the manufacture of some articles in which we 
formerly held an undisputed supremacy ; and when for- 
eign masters can undersell us in our home market, the 
question naturally arises, what is the cause of all this? 
In my opinion, the chief answer to that question is to be 



212 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

found in the condition of the scliools and workshops of 
the Continent." 

The apprenticeship-school proper had not at that time 
been tried in Britain, except, perhaps, among the potteries 
of Staffordshire, or to teach the theory and art of weaving 
in Yorkshire, Bradford, and Glasgow. And to show how 
much the British Government is interested in the sub- 
ject, we may allude to the royal commissioners appointed 
in August, 1881, on technical instruction, already men- 
tioned. The commission consisted of gentlemen of great 
experience in that line of inquiry, and they commenced 
their work in the most practical manner by visiting, in 
the first instance, the countries in which the industrial 
school had already passed through a rigorous ordeal, and 
where they could make scientific deductions from practi- 
cal results. In the following March they made a partial 
report which deals exclusively with France, and is devot- 
ed to the subjects of elementary instruction and appren- 
ticeship-schools. The report is well calculated to make a 
strong and favorable impression, more especially with 
regard to the latter as a method of training skilled arti- 
sans. They point out the ease with which the pupils find 
employment upon leaving school, and the high rate of 
wages they receive, and that, while being instructed in 
the various trades, they also receive a somewhat advanced 
literary and scientific education. 

Having made this brief and limited explanation of in- 
dustrial education in Europe, two questions properly arise : 

1. What effect has it exercised upon industry, and 
what benefit has it conferred upon the industrial classes ? 

2. Are such educational metliods suitable for the Unit- 
ed States? 



INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS IN EUROrE. 213 

In regard to the first point, it migbt be sufficient to 
answer that all Europe seems to be in favor of these 
schools. ]^ot only governments and municipalities estab- 
lish them as a systematic branch of education, but men 
of the greatest eminence, and those who are the most 
competent to form a correct conclusion, advise an exten- 
sion of industrial teaching for both sexes. This senti- 
ment is as strong in republican France, and frugal Switzer- 
land, and industrious Germany, as in the dominions of 
the Czar. An opinion so universal could only have its 
birth in an experience of the most positive and bene- 
ficial results. And all concur in attributing to this in- 
struction the introduction of new local industries in the 
centers of trade, as in Paris, Creuzot, Limoges, Ghent, 
Chemnitz, and other places on the Continent ; and to 
this influence is also due the general improvement of 
British manufactures, which now rival in taste those of 
her neighbors, and has done so much to restore her 
commercial supremacy in most all branches of industrial 
art. We have mentioned the Royal Commission to in- 
quire into technical education in foreign countries. In 
February, 1883, they made a preliminary report, already 
mentioned, which the Bureau of Education has embod- 
ied in a circular as a valuable addition to the current 
knowledge upon that subject. They refer exclusively to 
France, and the wonderful activity there displayed in 
all that relates to the instruction of artisans. Among 
their conclusions they say: "We think it will be evi- 
dent, from the account which we have given of the new 
laws -enacted and proposed, that their influence on the 
diffusion of ordinary and superior primary instruction, 
both literary and technical, can scarcely be overrated. 



214 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

It is clearly the aim of the government and of the great 
cities that this superior instruction shall be placed as ful- 
ly as possible within the reach of the working-men. The 
instruction in the use of tools during the elementary school 
age, besides being of service to every child, whether des- 
tined to become a mechanic or not, will tend, in the for- 
mer case, to facilitate the learning of a trade, though it 
may not actually shorten the necessary period of appren- 
ticeship. We should be glad to see this kind of manual 
instruction introduced into some of our own elementary 
schools." * 

By a decree of the French Government, in March, 
1880, a Commission of Inspection was appointed in con- 
nection with the school of the Boulevard de la Yillette, 
founded by the city of Paris, and which has been de- 
scribed in this chapter. A. Corbon, senator, makes the 
report, and points out some errors in making the pro- 
gramme of ordinary instruction too advanced for the 
attainments of the scholars, but speaks well of the theo- 
retical and practical instruction as regards technical teach- 
ing, and expresses confidence that it will go on improving, 
and concludes as follows : " The commission has there- 
fore every confidence that the problem will be satisfac- 
torily solved, and that the first school for apprentices, 
founded by the Yille de Paris, will be an excellent model 

* In August, 1881, a commission consisting of Bernhard Samuelson, 
F. R. S. ; Henry Enfield Roscoe, LL. D., F. R. S. ; Philip Magnus, B. A., B. Sc. ; 
John Slagg, Swire Smith, and William Woodall, was appointed by Queen 
Victoria to inquire into the instruction of the industrial classes of certain 
foreign countries in technical and other subjects, for the purpose of com- 
parison with that of the corresponding classes in Great Britain ; and into 
the influence of such instruction on manufacturing and other industries in 
their own and foreign countries. 



INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS IN EUROPE. 215 

for imitation." * And H. Tolain, senator, from the sub- 
commission of the same body appointed to examine into 
the question of apprenticeship-schools, declares that they 
" unanimously recognized the necessity for establishing 
these useful institutions." 

These commissions were both formed of gentlemen 
possessed of various attainments, and whose experience 
and special means for coming to a correct judgment can- 
not be denied. And when they finish the collection of 
data bearing upon the subject of their inquiry, their con- 
clusions as to the value of these institutions will be re- 
ceived by us, at least, with respect, if not confidence. 
Indeed, the time for pleading the cause of technical in- 
struction is past. The division of labor, the invention 
of machines, and the decay of apprenticeship, make it 
the peculiar necessity of the age, and it is, therefore, 
one of the conditions of industry which it is impossible 
to change. No wonder, then, that we witness the two 
greatest industrial nations on the globe employing such 
vast means on account of manual instruction as a practical 
necessity of the first order ; nor need we be surprised 
that it is now regarded as the duty of the state and the 
right of the artisan, from the facts of their industrial life. 

The beneficial effect of technical instruction upon the 
condition of the industrial classes is very forcibly stated 
in the replies of the British ministers abroad to inquiries 

* The Commission is composed of Messieurs Nadaud, deputy (president) ; 
Grdard, vice-rector of the university ; Tolain, senator ; Metivier and Tho- 
rel, municipal councillors ; De Montmahou, inspector general of public 
instruction ; Clerc, inspector of elementary education ; Moutard, professor 
at the School of Mines ; Carre, engineer ; Bourdin, late engineer delegate, 
secretary ; and Corbon, senator, reporter. 



216 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

addressed to tliein by Lord Stanley for information on this 
subject. From the selections of Mr. Stetson we give the 
answer of Mr. Lowther, from Berlin, who says : 

The advantage obtained is that there has been a very 
good class of workmen established which thinks, and has 
a knowledge of the things they are required to make, and 
consequently comprehends more easily. The class of 
workmen has also become better mannered, more civilized 
and refined. The middle class of trades-people has been 
able to raise the profession ; it lias been able to carry into 
effect all repairs in factories, and to arrange and direct 
them in such a way that they were cared for in the most 
convenient manner. It has been able to introduce new 
methods in manufactures. The high education of Ger- 
man engineers has caused the profession to be very much 
sought after on account of its extensive and fundamental 
knowledge. 

By means of all these circumstances, Prussian estab- 
lishments, like Prussian industry, have been able to raise 
themselves. . . . The workmen feel the influence of 
the knowledge they have acquired, and are anxious to at- 
tend the lectures at their unions which conduce to show 
the workmen the importance of theoretical knowledge. 

Lord Howard de Walden, in his reply, says that the 
benefits which these institutions have conferred and are 
conferring upon the working population of Flanders, as 
regards their material prosperity, and in opening a career 
of remunerative labor to all who are willing to avail 
themselves of the opportunity placed within their reach, 
while teaching them, at the same time, early habits of 
discipline and order, are incontestable. With his reply 
he sent the report of the Minister of the Interior on in- 
dustrial education in Belgium. Of the good influence of 
the school at Soignies, the minister says : " The school 



BENEFICIAL EFFECT UPON WORKING CLASSES. 217 

has a good influence upon the working class and upon 
the industry of the town of Soignies and the neighbor- 
hood. It provides this industry with eflicient powers 
and skilled workmen, w^ho work the stone with taste, and 
execute the most complicated work, and, above all, re- 
markable carvings, which the owners of the quarries 
could hardly undertake before, or which they were 
obliged to have executed elsewhere. On the other hand, 
it provides the pupils with knowledge which enables 
them to improve their conditions considerably. It also 
acts favorably on their morality, giving them a taste for 
study, and ideas of order and providence which contrib- 
ute to the spread of well-being and competency in fami- 
lies." 

These communications were made as early as 1867, 
and since then the schools have greatly increased, and the 
good influence of art and manual instruction have been 
extended to a great variety of work which employs skilled 
labor. M. Haverez, who is at the head of the school at 
Yerviers, describes the extraordinary results of the educa- 
tion at that place, and in his speech he gives an account of 
a school founded at Lille, designed for firemen and stokers, 
and of this one he says : 

The young workmen received all the knowledge for 
heating boilers well, and for keeping them in good condi- 
tion and safety. Those engaged in the working of mines 
soon perceived that the workmen who came from this 
school heated the boilers better and with less coal than 
did other workmen, and that they escaped many accidents 
and repairs and stoppage of machinery. These firemen 
were therefore much sought after, and everywhere they 
were, very properly, able to demand higher wages, because 
their work was of more value to their employers. Already 



218 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

in Cbarleroi, the situations of foremen in collieries, fur- 
naces, and mechanics' shops, are only given to those over- 
seers who have obtained a diploma of the professional 
school of Charleroi. 

Indeed, the advantages confen-ed by this instruction 
upon the workmen are corroborated by the strongest tes- 
timony and in many ways. The pupils find employment 
at good wages, their labor brings more than that of igno- 
rant workmen ; they are more likely to obtain preferment, 
for they are more intelligent and more useful ; they are 
better fed, better clothed, better housed, and better be- 
haved ; and their condition, morally and socially, is im- 
proved in a very remarkable degree. 

As to the second point, whether this system of in- 
struction is adapted to the needs and tastes of the people 
of the United States, that presents a question so far from 
the line of study and observation of the author, that per- 
haps little account can be made of his opinion. He, how- 
ever, can appeal on this subject with great confidence to 
the views generally entertained and expressed by the most 
distinguished educators in this country, for they all agree 
that we ought to have some plan of industrial training. 
The only question which appears to divide them, or to 
divide others, is whether it shall be the business of the 
public school to provide it. Dr. E. E. White, who argues 
against its introduction into public education, very forci- 
bly expressed his opinion to be for special schools to pro- 
mote important industries or to meet the wants of classes, 
and that the State has the right to supplement the public 
school by special schools for technical training ; and in 
his speech on industrial education before the American 
Institute, he said : " But, of course, I could take no ex- 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN UNITED STATES. 219 

ception to all that may be said in favor of technical and 
industrial schools standing beside the public schools and 
carrying on this work of education — giving to our youth 
technical and special training for industrial pursuits. 
That is what we have got to do in this country. We 
must have a system of technical training, and the question 
is, shall we put a system into the public schools, as they 
are now organized T' and he indicated an opinion very 
strongly against blending the two systems. 

On the same occasion, John S. Clarke, of Boston, read 
an exceedingly well prepared and philosophical paper on 
the same subject, in which he traces a theory of prac- 
tical education for the public schools, in the use of hand- 
tools in wood and metals, not for application in any par- 
ticular trade or trades, but for developing skill of hand in 
the fundamental manipulations connected with the indus- 
trial arts, and also as a means of mental development ; and 
he adds : " Secondary schools must provide a way to give 
broader instruction in experimental and theoretical sci- 
ence ; and, also, in a generalized form, instruction in man- 
ual training, including the use of hand and machine tools, 
not in its application to any special trade or trades, nor as 
a training divorced from general intellectual culture, but 
as an essential part of a sound general education." 

We may remark that these views derive additional 
strength from the almost uniform testimony of business 
and commercial authorities. The scientific journals, the 
trade magazines, and tlie daily press, all unite in recog- 
nizing the necessity of training men and women to be- 
come intelligent masters of the principles upon which the 
useful arts depend, and the practice by which they are 
made profitable. The reconstruction of our industries, 



220 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

which has been going on for several years, and which is 
still progressing on a scale of unexampled magnitude, 
has rendered the necessity of doing this either a duty 
of the public, or of the liberality of individuals. Indeed, 
the new system has already made some progress, and is in 
a fair way of making more, as we shall show hereafter. 
We may, therefore, conclude that the relation of educa- 
tion to industry, which is simply to put thought into the 
hand of labor, is one of the conditions upon which our 
prosperity depends. 



CHAPTER XII. 

Education applied to industry in the United States — Impulse given to it — 
Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York — Mr. Auchrauty's contribu- 
tion — Instruction in trades, common and decorative — To turn out 
trained mechanics — New York trade schools — Art school at Trenton, 
New Jersey — The youth at the potteries — Lasell Seminary — A modi- 
fied industrial school — Dwight School, Boston — Sewing-classes for girls 
in Boston schools — Excellent work by them — Art needle-work an 
industry — For house decoration — On ladies dresses — Code in England 
— Schools for sewing in Switzerland — Germany — Bavaria — Drawing in 
embroidery — Dorchester industrial school — Public schools at Montclair, 
New Jersey — Industrial department — The order of exercises — Indus- 
trial art-school in Philadelphia — Mr. Leland's system of teaching the 
minor arts — Their great variety — Outlay for such a school — Practical 
results — It revives the popular arts — Useful to all — The Spring Garden 
Institute — Mechanical handiwork — Course of instruction — Results — 
Technological and industrial training schools — At Worcester and St. 
Louis — Industrial home school at West Washington, District of 
Columbia — Cincinnati School of Design — A school of industrial art — 
New mode of industrial education required — Reasons for the change — 
Subdivision of labor — The general artisan — Great advantage of — 
Manual and technical instruction the practical want — Appeal to the 
wealthy. 

And now let us return to our native industries. 
Education, as applied to industry, is of but recent origin, 
and has not yet made much advance in the United States ; 
and as we are greatly behind other countries in this ten- 
dency, we cannot much longer omit some definite move- 
ment for planting the germs of what will become a com- 



! 



222 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 



preliensive system of industrial science. 'No people can I 
come down, or up, as ttie case may be, to the practical | 
realities of life more directly than Americans, and when ^ 
the time arrives they adopt means quite adequate to the \ 
necessities of the times. They are liberal patrons of art- ;j 
work, and this is witnessed by the immense sums they i 
pay for it. Our manufacturers realize the great change i 
which has taken place since the Centennial Exhibition of \ 
1876, and are seeking assiduously, at home and abroad, j 
for skilled workmen, and for the means of giving beauti- 
ful forms to useful articles. This impulse has given rise \ 
undoubtedly to some isolated efforts at manual training, ; 
which inspire the hope that our peculiar necessities are i 
appreciated at home, and that some extended system will ! 
be adopted to encourage and foster industrial education. i 
Among the movements in this direction are the efforts [ 
of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in the city of New i 
York. According to a statement in the New York \ 
"Times," that institution opened classes for instruction { 
in designing upon wood and metal. The trustees had no 
means to carry this experiment out, when a liberal prop- 
osition was made to them by Mr. K. T. Auchmuty, to i 
erect suitable buildings for this purpose, and to open j 
schools for some of the decorative arts, such as house- j 
painting, frescoing, and wood-carving ; pledging himself ; 
to pay during three years any deficiency which might 
exist between the receipts and expenses. We are also \ 
informed that his plan did not contemplate entirely free 
schools, on the ground that the apprentices would value j 
more what they paid for, and that by a fee, say of $100 \ 
a year, the schools could be made, in time, self-support- | 
ing. They are intended to do thorough work, and to j 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN UNITED STATES. 223 

train thorongli practical mechanics in artistic trades, who 
will earn their living by them. And the apprentices 
trained in these schools ought to be workmen capable of 
nice design and delicate workmanship. The courses of 
instruction comprise a general course for beginners, and 
special courses for mechanics who may desire to improve 
themselves in particular branches of their trade. Thus, 
in the school of plain and decorative painting, besides 
the general course, there will be special courses in mix- 
ing colors, in fresco-painting, in the combination of colors 
in panel-painting, and in the polishing and preparation 
of hard wood. All these, and similar decorative trades, 
are in enormous demand in New York, and well-trained 
young men in them find remunerative business without 
any trouble. The graduates of these schools would soon, 
no doubt, equal the foreign craftsmen who are imported 
to do the best work ; and thus there would be a natural 
and local supply of skilled workmen which, with other 
facilities, might soon make New York the equal of Paris, 
Lyons, and other continental cities, in decorative arts. 
In common trades, such as plumbing, painting, and build- 
ing, it is notorious that we have few apprentices, and 
few skilled laborers growing up. Most of the mechanics 
have learned their trades in daily labor. No one can 
fail to see the effect in imperfect work. These industrial 
schools will tend to bring up a class of thoroughly trained 
mechanics, who will lead their trades, and earn the high- 
est wages ; and this, again, by a natural law, will stimu- 
late the foundation of more such schools. 

The generous founder of the schools just mentioned, 
prompted no doubt by these considerations, is already 
erecting the buildings for them on First Avenue and 



224 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

Sixtj-seventli Street, at an expense of several thousand 
dollars. It is hoped that there are other liberal citizens 
in ISTew York who are willing to endow such schools in 
perpetuity. This experiment of the Museum of Art is a 
sound one, and might well be the beginning of a great 
and comprehensive scheme. 

We learn from the New York Herald, of August 
31, 1881, that the school commenced in the fall of 1880, 
and has now been in active operation over one year. It 
drew a large attendance from the first, there being one 
hundred and forty-eight pupils, who have received practi- 
cal instruction in drawing and design, decoration in dis- 
temper, modeling and carving, carriage-draughting, and 
plumbing, in day and evening classes. Lectures were 
given by specialists in the trades and arts, and a prime 
feature was made of shop instruction to foremen and 
young men employed in the city. 

The school was closed in the spring of 1881, and a 
wealthy gentleman has given to the same institution 
$50,000 to be devoted to the advancement of art-education. 
The art classes have therefore been withdrawn from this 
building and established elsewhere on an independent 
basis, and the artisan classes remain and are known as the 
New York Trade Schools. The courses of instruction for 
these in the year 1881-'82 will embrace many new feat- 
ures. There is a large and well-appointed workshop, 
where instruction will be given in the manual branches 
of the trades. Attached to this workshop is a collection 
of articles and materials used in plumbing. Dr. Chandler, 
of the Board of Health, and Professor Egleston, of the 
School of Mines of Columbia College, will take part in 
the series of lectures to be given to the classes. 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN UNITED STATES. 225 

An art-school has been founded bj the manufacturers 
of pottery at Trenton, New Jersey, to be attended by pot- 
ters' apprentices. There are few artistic trades in this 
country where more could be done if there were a suffi- 
cient supply of skilled labor. Why should we import 
such immense quantities of these goods, and employ so 
many English and French workers in this beautiful in- 
dustry, when we have such abundance of means in our 
own country for the business, both in excellent clays and 
generally intelligent labor, except for the want of special 
training in the workmen ? 

We are not informed as to the course of study pre- 
scribed in the Trenton school ; but at last accounts it was 
an assured success. The youth of the potteries have 
taken to it in a manner that has surprised the more san- 
guine expectations of its founders, and they study as if 
their future advancement in the business depended en- 
tirely upon their efforts in the art-school. The school 
will undoubtedly be extended, and classes added for the 
best pupils. 

A very favorable account is given by a correspondent 
in the Washington Republic of an educative experiment 
at Lasell Seminary, in Auburndale, a small town some 
ten miles from the city of Boston. From an experiment, 
however, the school seems to have advanced to an estab- 
lished and permanent method, which is determining in 
its influence. This plan is a modification of industrial 
instruction introduced on the same footing with tech- 
nical study. The manual labor department of a girls' 
school has had, and in many cases will have, its place, 
but to produce good results it requires the necessities to 
meet, and also exceptional girls, both in physical and 
11 



226 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

mental strength, to receive its benefits. At Lasell, classes 
are taught cooking and sewing, just as thej are taught 
mathematics or music, as an essential part of a woman's 
education. The cooking lessons are under Miss Parton's 
tuition, and thej are treated with all the deferential con- 
sideration due to solid geometry or metaphysics. It 
dates back to 1857, when it was established by Professor 
Edward Lasell, of Williams College, a pupil of the well- 
known Dr. West, of Brooklyn. Its Principal is Pro- 
fessor C. C. Bragdon, a graduate of the Northwestern 
University of Illinois, a man whose intellect is eminently 
alive to genuine advancement and practical progress. 
The seminary is beautifully situated in large, shaded 
grounds, with pure air, and a sunny aspect that charms 
the visitor like magic, and is fitted up with steam heat- 
ing and all modern improvements. Professor Bragdon's 
ideal of a girl's education is to make it a development 
and a discipline that will enable her to take hold of life 
for herself, to come out with implements by which she 
may be independent, self-supporting if necessary, and 
which will fit her to create a home. " But does not cook- 
ing and dressmaking interfere with studies?" asks some 
one. 'No more than studies interfere with each other. 
Greek is not studied less because of German, nor does 
mathematics suffer from a knowledge of history. For 
the majority of women the interests of home are to be 
the predominant ones of life, and whatever fits her for 
that gives her a vantage ground. If it can be inspired 
with a spirit, a purpose, it is thus redeemed from drudg- 
ery. Our American girls are mostly to be housekeepers, 
happy wives and mothers, and a professional training in 
domestic arts, combined with the fine advantages offered 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 227 

in technical study, render Lasell Seminary an ideal school 
for girls. It is a genuine home-school — one whose influ- 
ences are all refined, pure, and elevating. 

The " Journal of Education " has the following notice 
of one of the schools in Boston : 

The friends of '* industrial education " will be pleased 
with the report of the master of the D wight School con- 
cerning an experiment which has been going on in his 
building during the past year. It is not very long, and 
was given to the board last month. This experiment in 
industrial or manual work was begun last January with a 
class of eighteen pupils. They were selected from the 
graduating class, and the second, third, and fourth classes. 
School discipline was maintained, and each boy was 
marked on the work done. The report says : " From 
the beginning to the close, the school went on with un- 
broken and successful regularity. The teacher was 
promptly on hand, the order was good, the pupils inter- 
ested. It was delightful to see the eager desire mani- 
fested everywhere in the room to do the day's work well. 
There was no absence, no tardiness. On one occasion a 
count was made, and seventeen out of eighteen pupils 
were found at work at one o'clock, when two was the 
hour for beginning." In its qffects upon the standing of 
the boys in the grades from which they were taken, the 
master says : " Here and there a complaint was made by 
the teacher of some second-class boy, that he was not do- 
ing his work well in his own room ; but the pupil, in 
every case, was so anxious to remain in the ' carpenter's 
class' that a word or two of warning was sufficient to 
bring his performance up to standard again. As far as 
the first class is concerned, no boy fell below the required 
per cent for graduation, and each boy received his 
diploma." 

It is also encouraging to know that classes of the 
girls attending the public schools in Boston are taught in 



228 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

sewing as a part of their education. All who are inter- 
ested in the education of girls have urged the necessity 
of teaching them this branch of industry, and the ex- 
periment has been attended with most satisfactory re- 
sults. Both parents and teachers give positive proofs 
that the time and attention taken from other studies have 
been most profitably devoted to these practical lessons. 
The children are pleased with the work, and much of it 
is beautifully done. They cut garments and make dresses 
with skill and talent, and the little girls soon excel their 
mothers in the use of the needle. Indeed, it is said that 
the latter take as much interest usuallj^ in it as the chil- 
dren. A teacher remarked to a visitor that he knew 
parents who would be willing to endure mach before 
they would permit their children to leave school for that 
reason alone. He also added that many of them earned 
their living by the use of the needle, and the number 
had not been small of those who had come back after 
graduation and told of remunerative positions they had 
secured through the knowledge of sewing they had ob- 
tained at school. 

In this connection we may say that an advance is also 
observable in art-needlework, which is rapidly developing 
into an industry. It appears that Mrs. Booth, the editor 
of Harper's Bazaar, has recognized the wide-spread desire 
for information in this almost forgotten art, and she has 
made a special arrangement with the South Kensington 
Museum by which the designs from that art-school are 
to be published in that journal. The Bazaar also pub- 
lishes designs furnished by the Vienna and Nuremberg 
schools of art-needlework. 

The magnificent style of decorating the houses of the 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 229 

wealthy has taken the direction of art-needlework em- 
broidery. The designs are often reproduced from old 
French and Italian tapestries, and many of them are 
made from nature; and plants, flowers, and leaves are 
constructed by conventional treatment into original and 
highly decorative designs. Abroad, the work of the 
Kensington and other schools has gained great celebrity, 
and the finest designs by Morris, Crane, Burne Jones, 
and other famous ornamentists have been wrought out 
on rich fabrics by ladies who found therein an agreeable 
and needed employment. 

With us the groundwork is velvet, Oriental stuffs, 
brocaded silk, lace, and other goods in vivid colors and 
changing hues. Artistic portieres^ rich draperies for 
cabinets and windows, and for the decoration of walls 
and furniture, are embroidered with branches of trees 
and flowers, having borders upon which are worked fig- 
ures of various kinds in gold and silver thread ; muslin 
curtains embroidered with gold to shade the deep bay- 
windows ; exquisite pale satin with roses, and sometimes 
the form of a sea-nymph half -risen from the water be- 
neath, the changing blue of the sky, and other ornaments 
in the most delicate colors to imitate the precious stones ; 
all of which harmonize with, walls upon which are sus- 
pended rare and costly paintings, and Limoges enamels 
of wonderful beauty which adorn the drawing-rooms and 
houdoirs of the wealthy in our cities. Any design which 
will produce decorative effect is now used in embroid- 
ery. 

Perhaps the most ingenious way in which this art is 
used is on ladies' dresses, cuffs, collars, and even stock- 
ings, which are often decorated with gold and silver 



230 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

spangles, and clusters of berries wliich shine and sparkle 
between the instep and the short costumes now in fash- 
ion. 

Among the employments which belong almost exclu- 
sively to women this is perhaps the most fascinating, and 
it is one which can never be superseded by the sewing- 
machine. Its votaries are found among all classes ; those 
who are well off being as eager in this lady-like art as are 
their more unfortunate sisters. 

The proposed revision of the educational code in 
England provides that sewing shall be made compulsory 
for all girls, and even for the boys who are under seven 
years of age. The latest reports show that in Switzerland 
4,373 females are employed in schools teaching needle- 
work alone ; and in all the people's schools in Germany, 
as well as in the numerous girls' schools, sewing and 
needlework are added to the other studies. In Bavaria 
alone there are over fifteen hundred schools in which this 
is a regular part of the programme, to say nothing of her 
thirty-six technological institutions, her polytechnic school 
at Munich, and four agricultural colleges. 

Every effort to afford practical instruction in this in- 
genious and refined art will receive essential assistance 
from its being made a requisite part of pubhc education. 
Instruction in drawing is necessary in order to enable the 
pupils to prepare, as well as understand, tasty designs in 
embroidery. It is a matter of common observation in 
the Boston schools that those who excel in drawing excel 
likewise in sewing; but that is not surprising when 
properly considered, for it is merely a training of the 
hand and eye in either case. 

Before leaving Boston, we find another instance of a 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 231 

small industrial school in Dorchester, now a part of that 
city, which has existed ever since 1853, for training girls 
in domestic affairs and other avocations. Its object has 
been to take poor and unprotected children and train 
them to good personal habits, to instruct them in house- 
hold labor, to exert a moral influence and discipline over 
their conduct, and to qualify them in methods of earning 
their own livelihood. A writer in the Boston Transcript 
says: 

Of those who have passed through the school, many 
are well provided for in homes of their own, many others 
supporting themselves honorably by nursing, cooking, 
parlor work or housework, or by trades of various kinds. 
This school is wholly supported by voluntary contributions. 

This reminds us of the practical plan of Mrs. Eliza- 
beth Thompson for establishing Kindergarten homes, and 
to remove thus away from their miserable surroundings 
and temptations the poor children in the cities who are 
likely to become inmates of poor-houses, asylums, and 
prisons, and teach their hearts to be good and their hands 
to be useful in industry. 

As the public schools at Montclair, 'New Jersey, are 
the very first, it is believed, in this country to adopt an 
industrial department, some little detail in explanation 
of the movement is excusable. The facts are derived 
from a friendly observer, but are undoubtedly substan- 
tially correct. 

The origin of industrial instruction in the Montclair 
public schools may be traced directly to a spirit of oppo- 
sition to the high school, in which the higher branches 
are taught, and boys and girls prepared for college. A 
large number of voters claimed that the taxes necessary to 



232 EDUCATION m ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

support the high school directly benefited but from sixty 
to eighty scholars, when the larger proportion of those 
who attended school, being obliged to leave before they 
are fourteen years, not only derive no advantage from 
the higher educational facilities, but have to go into the 
world without any practical knowledge whatever. 

To counterbalance this apparent inequality in the dif- 
ferent departments of the educational system, a committee 
of ladies and gentlemen was appointed at a meeting of 
the legal voters of the school district, held July, 1881, to 
examine the various plans of technical or industrial edu- 
cation in practical operation, and to report at a subsequent 
meeting as to the feasibility of incorporating with the 
grammar school a department for technical instruction. 
During the ensuing school year the committee examined 
the plans and workings of various industrial and technical 
schools in Philadelphia, New York, and Massachusetts ; 
and in May, 1882, presented their report, in which they 
stated what they had seen and done in the premises, and 
recommended the formation of an industrial department 
in the Montclair public schools. They recommended 
further, that the instruction afforded by such a depart- 
ment should not be technical, but should be designed and 
adapted to impart, as far as possible, a general knowledge 
of the use of tools, and to inspire the pupils with confi- 
dence in their own ability to do something of a practical 
nature. To carry out this plan an appropriation of $1,000 
was voted at the annual appropriation meeting in July ; 
and in September, 1882, the system went into effect. 
The plan followed was substantially that adopted by the 
school of Gloucester, Massachusetts ; i. e., a two years' 
course of instruction in the use of wood-working tools, 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 233 

and tlie two classes, numbering some thirty-five each, 
were selected from the second and third grades of the 
grammar department as those who would be the most 
directly benefited by such instructions. Their ages are 
from eleven to fifteen years. 

During the six months that have already elapsed each 
boy has received weekly two hours' industrial instruction. 
After fitting up the shop, the procurement of a suitable 
instructor became the question of greatest importance. 
The trustees found that with the limited funds at their 
disposal they could not command such services as they 
desired, viz., those of a young, reliable mechanic who 
should be not only a master of his trade, but have the ad- 
ditional faculty of imparting his knowledge to others and 
of exciting the enthusiasm of his students in their work. 
They finally secured the services of a capable master-car- 
penter who thoroughly understands his vocation. 

The natural tendency of the pupils was to regard the 
work-hour as a time for recreation, and it took some time 
to impress upon them the fact that it was as much a part 
of the school exercises as any recitation. The class has 
been taught, in order, the use of the hammer, saw, chisel, 
and plane ; and the principles of cutting, squaring, and 
joining wood, including the art of mortising and dovetail- 
ing. At present they are engaged in making pine and wal- 
nut frames. On the whole, their work is very creditable. 
No attempt is made to derive any profit from the work, 
such a step being deemed for the present unadvisable. 

Of the practical results obtained it is too early to form 
any reliable opinion. In making the experiment, boys 
have been taken into the classes without regard to their 
aptitude, and those who expected to see them in three 



23:1: EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

months develop into mechanics have been disappointed. 
It certainly has given the pupils knowledge of a prac- 
tical character which will be of use through life, and 
it has also, observably, made them more self-reliant. 
The expenses of the current year may slightly exceed the 
amount of the appropriation. It is not expected that 
the boys shall become proficient in any of the work taught 
in the class unless by means of outside practice. The 
aim and object kept in view is to develop an inclination 
for mechanical pursuits, and to so far familiaiize them 
with the general use of tools as to foster and encourage a 
desire and purpose to master their use, by the exercise 
outside of the class of the principles and modes of prac- 
tice in real work. The tools are all numbered and stored 
in a series of tool-chests, and a set of tools is allotted to 
each boy in each class, who becomes responsible for their 
care. Each pupil has his own place at the work-benches. 
The order of exercises consists usually, first, of an ex- 
planation, by means of a blackboard, of the w^ork assigned 
for the hour, and of the principle involved, and of the 
proper order of detail and practice. The actual use of 
the tools is then proceeded with, each boy in turn receiv- 
ing such immediate instruction as may be required. The 
technical rules for the best method of work in the ac- 
complishment of the matter in hand are given, and pains 
taken that the boys shall become familiar with their prac- 
tical a23plication. Thus far, the classes have been taught 
the proper use of the hammer, plane, saw, and chisel ; and 
the sharpening and care of tools ; and in the use thereof 
have been taught the art of planing neatly, of joining 
rough edges truly and squarely, of sawing truly with both 
rip and crosscut saws, of boring accurately and to a pur- 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 235 

pose, and are now engaged in making dovetailed joints, 
and forming neat miters, mortises, etc. 

As in all other studies, there is a wide variance in the 
proficiency of the several scholars, but all have been 
manifestly profited, and greatly interested and pleased, in 
discovering the possibilities of power and self-help found 
latent in their own hands and fingers, and which they can 
master, and, by proper development, with the aid of a few 
tools, make serviceable for their own profit and the enjoy- 
ment of others. No text-books have been used or recom- 
mended, the teaching having been wholly confined, thus 
far, to oral and practical instruction without study outside 
of the class-room.* 

* The lesson of December 2, 1882, was for making frames about a foot 
square, and the following rules were placed upon the blackboard. It is 
given as a sample of the work on which the pupils were engaged : 

1. Gauge strip 3^ inches wide. 

2. Plane to gauge-mark, using jack-plane, jointer, and try-square. 

3. Gauge all round the strip f of an inch from marked side. 

4. Plane to gauge-mark, using jack-plane and jointer. 

5. Gauge strip l^ inches from each edge, also in center of the two gauge- 
marks just made. 

6. Rip the strip in two at the center gauge-mark last made with a rip-saw. 

I. Plane the strips to gauge-marks, straight and square, using jack-plane, 
jointer, and try-square. 

8. Saw the strip, marking from pieces 12^ inches long. 

9. Gauge the pieces on each end in center of thickness, also on their 
edges from the ends two inches up. 

10. Mark round the pieces with pencil If inches from end, using try- 
square. 

II. Saw down on flat side to gauge-marks, also down the ends to meet 
the cuts just made, sawing out the halvings, using crosscut-saw. 

12. Fit halvings together, using paring-chisel, keeping the frame square 
and '* out of wind." 

13. Fasten corners with screws. 

14. Trim corners with smoothing-plane and saw. 



236 EDUCATION m ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

We have dwelt upon this instance as an example for 
other places who might wish to follow it, in order to give 
facilities to their youth for acquiring instruction which is 
so necessary in the industrial pursuits. 

A system of instruction in art-industry has been in 
operation for two years in the HoUings worth Buildings, 
Locust Street, Philadelphia, under the management of 
Mr. Charles G. Leland, and it has already established a re- 
markable character of its own. Few things of an educa- 
tional kind are more interesting than the accounts which 
come to us of the wonderful success of this undertaking 
to teach industrial art in the public schools of that city. 
The Bureau of Education has issued Circular 4, 1882, 
which was prepared by Mr. Leland, explaining his theory 
of hand-work in j)ublic schools, and the result of his ex- 
perience in the practical work of teaching it ; and no one 
can read the report without feeling a lively interest in 
this effort to educate the eye, the hand, and the mind, at 
the same time. 

As a preparation for industrial art-work, it is neces- 
sary that the pupil should be able to design. Drawing is 
therefore the first step, and Mr. Leland claims that by his 
method of teaching it can be learned in much less time 
than is usually required, besides teaching at the same time 
the application of the art in practical work, so as to enable 
the scholars to earn a living at once by making something 
that can be sold. From drawing a straight line the pu- 
pil proceeds immediately to outline ornament for decora- 
tive work. Tracing and the aid of ruler and instruments 
are permitted, but are soon abandoned, and in a very 
short time a boy or girl of ordinary capacity can design 
beautiful original patterns which are made to serve ex- 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 237 

clusivelj upon the work of the student. Only practical 
results are aimed at. Great importance is attached to 
free-hand drawing, and it is taught with special reference 
to the studies of the school. The principles of construc- 
tion lines receive some attention, but geometrical forms 
do not appear to be of much account in the plan of in- 
struction, and perhaps it is unimportant to the purposes 
of the system. 

After pointing out the order of industrial develop- 
ment, the circular alluded to proceeds thus : 

This universal truth, that man develops the ornament- 
al, during the infancy of every race, before the useful, 
is illustrated in every individual. The child, who can- 
not as yet make a shoe or file metals or master a trade, 
can, however, learn to design decorative outline patterns, 
mold beautiful pottery, set mosaics, carve panels, work 
sheet-leather, and repousse or emboss sheet-brass. He or 
she can cut and apply stencils, model papier-mache, or 
carton-pierre (a mixture of composition and paper-pulp), 
inlay in wood, and make a great variety of elegant ob- 
jects. If a child can learn to sew, read, sing, draw, and 
model in the Kindergarten, it can surely pursue higher 
branches, both literary and manual, in higher schools. 
The system on which this industrial art-work should be 
taught is as follows : It does not merely consist of certain 
definite branches, such as modeling or carving according 
to patterns ; it is the learning how to design the patterns, 
and then worhing them out in any material, such as wood, 
clay, brass, embroidery stuffs, or stencils. There are fifty 
or a hundred such minor arts, and anybody who can draw 
or design can with very little practice in a few days ex- 
ecute them fairly in any substance which will retain im- 
pressions. It is a remarkable law of nature or of human- 
ity that all the minor arts, or such branches of industry 
as are allied to ornament, are very easy, and can generally 



238 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

be so far mastered in a day by anybody who can draw, as 
to enable the pupil to produce a perfectly encouraging 
result. But industrial art, to be taught in schools, need 
not and should not be limited to ornamental work. This 
is to be at first followed, simply because it is the only 
work easy enough for children and girls. Carpenter's 
work, or joinery, in its rudiments, or in fact any branch 
of practical industry, may be taken up as soon as the pu- 
pil is fitted for it. Industrial art in schools covers the 
ground or fills the time intervening between the Kinder- 
garten and the industrial school, but it blends with and 
includes the latter. It is characteristic in this, that the 
system, as I conceive it, is capable of being introduced 
into every public or private school in the country, or into 
any institution where there is a preceptor who has some 
knowledge of drawing, with sense enough to apply it ac- 
cording to certain elementary hand-books of art. 

The school began its work in April, 1881, with nearly 
a hundred pupils, half teachers and half scholars. The 
children are from twelve to fifteen years of age. Every 
teacher in the public schools selects one or two scholars. 
These are divided into two classes, one attending on Tues- 
days from 3 to 5, the other on Thursdays at the same 
hours. When the pupils can make a fair original design, 
they learn painting, modeling, carving, embroidery, or 
metal work. They are, however, variously occupied, some 
in painting plaques and tiles, some in carving walnut pan- 
els, or in making brackets, doilies, tidies, chair-backs, 
hammering brass-work and different kinds of sheet-metal, 
and still others in a variety of modeling, ornamenting, 
and glazing clay-work, and the girls in designing pat- 
terns which they work in outline embroidery ; and the 
work thus done is of such a character as to be suitable 
for decorative effect, and as can be readily sold for a good 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 239 

price in the market. The operations in modeling are 
taught in systematic treatment, and embrace a great vari- 
ety of plastic objects, snch as jars, vases, flowers, fishes, 
branches, vines, and leaves, in which each pupil carries 
out his own design according to his own hking, and no 
uniform rule has been adopted except that it must be 
original. The work in sheet-metals and in wood-carving 
gives evidence of skill even in those who have not prac- 
ticed it longer than a few weeks ; showing that this kind 
of skill can be easily acquired by any child in the public 
schools. Yery excellent specimens in drawing are exhib- 
ited at the table devoted to that study, from the simplest 
forms uj) to well-developed ornaments, and are afterward 
successfully used on the material of their work. Art 
needlework is taught before plain sewing, as it is said to 
make the latter easier in the end. The art of stenciling, 
or flower-painting on cloth, is practiced, the picture being 
surrounded by an outline of needlework, producing very 
salable articles by means of their beauty. Practice in 
drawing and modeling, owing to its great variety, leads 
gradually to tempered beauty in original designs upon 
7'epousse-worky on carved wood, vases, and jars, and in 
patterns for embossed leather, wall-paper, carpets, mosa- 
ics, inlaying, and articles of furniture, for the execution 
of all these may be intrusted to the pupils and sold for 
their benefit. 

The outlay for a small school or club on the humblest 
scale is estimated at not more than $20 or $30. The re- 
quirements of a school on a large scale for a city would 
be more. The school board at Philadelphia appropriated 
$1,500 in the year 1882 for the maintenance of the 
school, and it was confidently asserted that it can be made 



240 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

entirely self-supporting, if not profitable, by means of the 
work done by the pupils. 

Of the practical results it is stated that there is a great 
demand for boys with such knowledge as is acquired in 
this school, and Mr. Leland adds : " I could without ex- 
ception find places in a great variety of manufactories for 
all the pupils in the public industrial school who have 
had about twenty lessons in design and modeling. . . . 
In a few weeks all who have advanced beyond design pro- 
duce work that has a market value."* 

The instruction in this school revives the traditions of 
these humble arts, many of which are almost forgotten, 
and some of them introduced for the first time into this 
country. They are not an invention. They constituted 
the popular art of the past, when the people had to help 
themselves to what was useful and beautiful, and when, 
consequently, the households of the common classes were 
made somewhat attractive by beautiful specimens of mod- 

* A correspondent writes to the " Decorator and Furnisher " as follows : 

The city of Philadelphia is the sole proprietor of the school, and through 
it has originated a reform in education which has never before been fully 
practiced either in Europe or America. 

This experimental school has been frequently visited by distinguished 
foreigners, as well as by many Americans, who have come to the city for 
the express purpose of examining it. 

The visitor will see about forty pupils engaged in studying designs, 
about as many more modeling vases, etc., in clay, with color and glaze, carv- 
ing in panels, embroidering, and painting in oil, etc. 

What these children are doing is to qualify them for the workshop or to 
teach. That the project is a success will appear from a few facts. A prac- 
tical manufacturer has taken many of the pupils, and pays them well, as he 
regards them sufficiently well trained to be of use as designers. 

A situation with good pay has been offered to a girl of fourteen, and 
one of the boy-students during his vacation of two months earned $218. 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 241 

eling and by designs in their furniture and domestic uten- 
sils. The plan of the institution revives the art-instincts 
of the people, and utilizes them in numerous branches of 
remunerative labor. It deserves the fullest recognition 
for the careful and systematic advancement of industrial 
art; especially since it is a department of the public 
school in a city so largely engaged in the interests of art- 
industry. Moreover, it has a practical value to thousands 
of children that cannot be estimated, for, under the in- 
struction here afforded, though entirely ignorant of any 
useful pursuit, they can become skilled in a great variety 
of hand-work, which will at once make them self-support- 
ing, and which will be of great service even to those who 
do not need to earn a living, as there is scarcely a situa- 
tion in life where a knowledge of these simple arts will 
not be useful, and a source of endless enjoyment .to all 
who can practice them.* 

The Spring Garden Institute, of the city of Philadel- 
phia, has an industrial department fittted up with bench- 
es, a forge, machine-tools driven by a gas-engine, and all 
the appliances of a first-class workshop. Instruction is 
given in mechanical handwork to classes meeting at night. 
It has a capacity of thirty-five pupils per night; each 
class meets two evenings per week, so that instruction 
can be given to about one hundred and five individual 
pupils, and it is used to its full capacity. The tuition is 

* Mr. Leland is editing a series of cheap illustrated art-manuals, in which 
are given in detail all the directions necessary for studying the minor arts, 
so that any number of ladies and gentlemen, who can draw, and who are 
interested in providing employment, or in advancing improvement among 
the young or poor, could form little schools or societies for teaching them 
in these means of industrial art, and preparing them for self-support by 
hand work of most every kind. 



24:2 EDUCATION IN ITS KELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

fixed at five dollars for two evenings per week for three 
months. 

Instruction in the metal course embraces filing, turn- 
ing, drilling, forging, and the mechanical work and draw- 
ing connected therewith ; the vise-work comprises twenty- 
six vises and one hundred and sixty running feet of bench- 
room, and instruction is given in every kind of filing on 
cast iron, steel, brass, and wrought iron. In regard to 
machine-tools, the shop is furnished with an engine, 
power planing-machine, lathes, drill-press, and the ne- 
cessary shafting, so that every opportunity to learn their 
practical use is afforded to the pupils. Besides, a modern 
forge has been provided, embracing the tools necessary 
in forging and welding, whether the work is simple or 
intricate, and molding and casting in practical founding 
work will be added (if not already added) at the neces- 
sary moment. 

It is the design of the managers to teach joiners as 
well as machinists, and for this purpose to introduce class- 
es in wood-working, wood-turning, carpentry and cabi- 
net-making, pattern-making, and other branches of that 
industry. 

A. very large number of the pupils are machinists or 
employes in machine-shops, who, in the absence of such 
instruction as was afforded to apprentices under the old 
system, seek this school as the best place in which to ac- 
quire a broad knowledge of the trade at which they work 
and special skill in the handling of tools. In the annu- 
al report of 1881 it is stated that, in the natural course of 
events, the schools have become employment agencies for 
the pupils who enter them, and, as a result of the instruc- 
tion given to the pupils, many of them have obtained de- 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 243 

sirable situations, and others have been advanced in their 
chosen professions. 

The pubhcations of several technological institutions 
show that they have excellent manual training-schools, 
in which the pupils are taught a variety of mechanical 
operations, including the use of tools and machinery 
in working upon wood and metal. The Worcester Free 
Institute and the Washington University at St. Louis, 
already mentioned, manufacture articles for sale, and are 
managed very much like other machine-shops, only that 
the pupils learn the science as well as the practice of 
mechanical art. The shops are fairly equipped with ma- 
chinery, and the instruction must be of excellent quality, 
for it is imparted by men of reputation in their profession, 
and the students they send out become civil and mechan- 
ical engineers and skilled workmen, and find situations as 
superintendents and foremen in other shops without diffi- 
culty. These schools are yet in their infancy, and are not 
sufficiently endowed so as to make instruction free, and 
they require assistance in order to advance the work to 
that point, and extend the sphere of their usefulness to all. 

The Industrial Home School, situated in West Wash- 
ington, District of Columbia, is another step in the path 
of practical education. It combines the advantages of a 
school and a home, to which are admitted a number of 
boys and girls — the children of poor parents, to be taught, 
besides the ordinary school-lessons, such industries as will 
fit them for the duties of life. The boys are taught many 
useful trades and employments, while the girls receive 
instruction in the various household and other duties ap- 
propriate to their sex. The principle upon which the 
school is founded comprehends the best training for chil- 



24:4: EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

dren in this world, that is, their symmetrical education by 
giving due consideration " to their mental, manual, and 
moral endowments. The mental is provided for by the 
public school, which is already a part of the education of 
this Home School. The manual is attaining importance 
by the industries which are already in successful operation 
in this school, such as shoemaking, gardening, cooking, 
sewing, and wood-work. And in this Cottage Home will 
be exemplified moral training, far better than it is at all 
possible by what is known as the system now happily 
passing away." The ground for the Cottage Home was 
broken for the building in the early summer (1881), and 
the institution has received the hearty sympathy of the 
friends of practical education, many of whom have de- 
voted their best efforts to its success. 

The Cincinnati School of Design exhibits a unique 
development of technical study and instruction in the 
practical work of some of the skillful industries, such as 
wood-carving, designs for work in metal, decoration of 
furniture, painting on china and porcelain. The students 
are of both sexes, and the course of study commences with 
lessons in drawing and the primary principles of design ; 
and when they can draw a limited number of leaves, 
flowers, birds, and vines, they are instructed in the true 
principles of decoration. In the report for the year 1878, 
as a proof of the efficiency of the school, a list is given of 
names and occupations of students who have turned their 
training to practical use, the record covering eight years. 
There are two hundred and eight names, fifty-four of them 
those of women. Lithographers, designers, sculptors, en- 
gravers, landscape-painters, and even sign-painters and 
"stripers," architects, decorators, turners, and others are 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 245 

mentioned in this list, and twentj-one persons are named 
as engaged in carving or other work in wood. The list, 
however, gives the names of those pupils onlj of whose 
subsequent course the teacher of drawing has positive 
knowledge, and a foot-note explains that the list includes 
but few of the members of the classes in carving, " for 
the reason that the larger number of the pupils in those 
classes have employed their talent in beautifying their 
own homes rather than in the production of objects for 
sale ; all of them have executed valuable pieces of work, 
and could earn a living by carving and designing were 
they so inclined." The only manufactory of carved wood 
in Cincinnati can probably be traced to the existence of 
the School of Design. 

We have emphasized these few examples of the In- 
dustrial School because they are new in this country, and, 
like almost every other innovation, will encounter many 
difficulties before they succeed in attaining a solid founda- 
tion. They show the progress already made, and should 
serve to encourage the friends of industrial education by 
the promise they suggest of still greater progress in the 
future. The old system of apprenticeship is already 
dead, nor is its general revival either possible or desirable. 
The great change in our industries requires a correspond- 
ing change in the mode of learning them. A knowledge 
of a handicraft now includes some proficiency in art-sci- 
ence, and has become an exponent of intellectual capacity. 
Most of the manual occupations require some instruction 
in the art of drawing and in the theoretical as well as 
practical elements of art-education. This was not attain- 
able when the apprentice picked his trade up in the course 
of daily labor, and his master was as ignorant as himself 



246 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

of the related principles. He learned slowly, for mucli 
of his time was occupied in unskilled work and menial 
service, and indeed his lot was often that of a mere 
drudge. Our industrial establishments, moreover, are on 
a surpassing scale of expense and mechanical perfection, 
often employing a thousand workmen ; and the individual 
mechanic, working in his own shop and giving scanty 
information to his apprentices, is fading out before the 
energies of modern skill and perseverance. We might 
as well find fault with this revolution as with the railway 
for taking the place of the stage-coach. Besides, we 
must remember also that our workshops are much more 
systematically organized, and that the work is split up 
into various subdivisions, so that each mechanic works 
only upon a mere fragment of his trade. It is said that 
in the Waltham shops a watch passes through the hands 
of seventy or eighty different workmen. It would be 
impossible for the young artisan to acquire anything like 
a general or scientific knowledge of his trade in a regular 
workshop. At the most he could become only a fragment 
of a workman. In several of the wood and iron trades 
this splitting-up process has been going on until a gener- 
ally skilled artisan in them is becoming almost unknown. 
It seems reasonable that this difficulty may be met and 
overcome by an industrial and technical education which 
will make workmen in the start by sending out graduates 
who understand the general application of scientific prin- 
ciples in the use of tools and machinery. There will in 
tlie nature of things always be a demand for the general 
artisan in the management of large establishments, and 
he will possess that great advantage over his fellow-work- 
man who has only got a small section of his trade. 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 217 

This transition in our manufactures and commerce 
demands a corresponding change in the education of the 
industrial classes ; and it is ahnost universally conceded, 
by those who have considered the question, that manual 
and technical instruction, while acquiring a trade, will 
supply this want. It is the trained hand that can turn 
general knowledge and sound theories to practical ac- 
count, and thus secure the physical prosperity which 
results from steady and remunerative employment. It 
is this which can redeem labor from its servile tendency ; 
for when labor is pursued without skill or cultivation it 
is very sure to deteriorate into mere brute force. Here, 
then, is the idea distinctly presented to our mind : we 
know what is wanted, and it is occupying our earnest 
attention in its gradual development to an established 
method. We know that the advance of an idea has in 
some instances been singularly tardy. But the experi- 
ment has been tried in Europe and on a small scale in 
the United States. Public-spirited citizens in our large 
cities should place sufficient sums of money at the disposal 
of the educational authorities to inaugurate such schools 
in accordance with the peculiar wants and industries of 
the locality ; and much of the time and means now ex- 
pended in studies which only serve to gratify taste, and 
will never be of service to the pupils, might be more 
profitably devoted to practical lessons in the proper pur- 
suits to be followed in after-life. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

Industry a matter of state importance — Schools for industry to be estab- 
lished by the state — Course pursued by Great Britain — Art-schools 
and drawing in England — Effect of, on prosperity — Manual instruction 
correlated — How to treat the question — Not to be introduced into the 
school-room — Dr. White's and Mr. MacAlister's views — Schools at 
]\Iontclair and Philadelphia — Manual training in Europe — It improves 
the pupils — Public opinion — Conflicting opinions and objections — State- 
ment of the same — Diversity of views — Mr. Stetson's — Dr. White's — 
United States' limited provision for industrial education — Consideration 
of popular objections — Instruction in the use of tools and machinery — 
Illustrations — Pursuits that resemble each other — Mechanical powers 
— Trades easily learned — Occupations will multiply — No danger of 
glutting them — Mode of industrial instruction — Moderate instruction 
at outset — Pupils with a general knowledge of hand-tools prepared for 
a variety of trades — Illustrated by Mr. Leland's school — A community 
of skilled workmen, its value — Further notice of industrial schools in 
Europe — Statement of M. Rossat — School at Charleville — Industrial 
training in French elementary schools — School of the Rue Tournefort 
— The French act of 1880 — Programme of the commission — Report of 
H. Tolman, senator — Conclusions of the Boston committee — Views of 
Mr. Steel — Important as coming from the right quarter. 

But the time has come to extend our view beyond 
these individual and scattered efforts, for it is claimed 
with much semblance of justice that the interdependence 
which exists between manual education and the industrial 
prosperity of the state is a subject of too much impor- 



THE STATE AND MANUAL EDUCATION. 249 

tance to be safely left either to the speculations of the 
mere philosophical theorist, or to the narrow and short- 
sighted views engendered by personal or local interests ; 
and it is therefore asserted that the state itself should 
recognize the relation between a high type of manual 
education and the great interests of material prosperity, 
just as it makes provision for the cultivation of the 
mental powers, and all that goes to make up the moral 
and intellectual capacity of the community ; and it is 
suggested that, as the common welfare becomes fixed and 
possible only by the joint labor of mental and physical 
endowments, the education of each should to some ex- 
tent pari j)assu accompany the other. It is argued that 
industrial schools should be established by the state ; or 
at least that opportunities for industrial instruction at its 
expense should be provided in different districts, to be 
determined, of course, by the pursuits and experience of 
the people. 

When Great Britain found herself outstripped at the 
Crystal Palace Exhibition, she " faced the music " at once, 
and established the South Kensington Museum, with its 
annexed art-schools, at an expense of six million dollars. 
There are now (1882) nearly two hundred art-schools in 
England, where thirty thousand people receive instruction ; 
and the progress is still more remarkable in the way of 
general education, for there are not less than four thou- 
sand two hundred schools where drawing is taught, and 
where nearly a million pupils are instructed in drawing 
and design. Between 18Y4 and 1878 Parliament ex- 
pended over one million dollars in aid of drawing-schools 
and museums of art. Says the author from whom I take 

these facts : " The English were eminently a practical 
12 



250 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

people, and thought this an excellent investment to in- 
crease the wealth of the nation ; . . . the English now sur- 
pass the world in certain kinds of articles." We may con- 
fidently affirm that the wealth and business prosperity of 
Great Britain are to-day owing as much to these schools as 
to any other cause, for by means of the improved appear- 
ance of all her mechanical products she has been enabled 
to regain her mastery all over the globe. She took the 
lesson of the Crystal Palace to heart, and set an eminent 
example of renaissance in her industrial art through the 
active agency of the Government. 

Much of the instruction received in the English art- 
schools, such as drawing, geometry, etc., has been recent- 
ly introduced into our public schools. If these were 
developed in close connection with the expedient of manu- 
al instruction, which would show the practical application 
of the knowledge acquired by the students in these stud- 
ies, public education would then be fixed upon the im- 
movable basis of industrial rights and conquests. The 
fact must sooner or later be recognized, that manual in- 
struction is correlated and inseparable in any adequate 
system of public teaching ; and that it is important that 
provision be made where our youth can be taught who 
intend to engage in industrial pursuits ; for without this 
assistance our skilled industries can not be. carried on ex- 
cept by the importation of that species of labor from other 
countries. 

The sneering observation is frequently heard that the 
public schools cannot be expected to turn out ready-made 
smiths, carpenters, wheelwrights, masons, brick-layers, 
shoemakers, tailors, and farmers. This is, of course, in- 
tended to be a crusher, and to settle the matter peremptori- 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 251 

ly. It is not exactly, however, upon this principle that the 
great question of industrial education is or ought to 
be treated. Good men may and do differ as to the best 
mode for the practical instruction of a whole community ; 
but they ought not to be embarrassed by a superficial slur. 
Even if this were the purpose of manual training, it would 
be as little a reproach to it as it is to the present system 
that it turns out so many ready-made clerks, book-keepers, 
accountants, insurance agents, and students prepared for 
entering college. The way in which manual training 
ought to be carried on, and the extent to which our pub- 
lic schools can be used for that purpose, is of course a 
question that will receive a variety of answers. It is not 
intended to introduce the pegging or the sewing machine, 
or any other machine into the school-room. Upon this 
subject there is much misunderstanding ; for, while the 
state has clearly a right to direct the ingredients of the 
education it freely furnishes to all, it is not intended that 
work and study are to occur in tlie same apartments or 
even in the same building necessarily. For instance, Dr. 
E. E. White, who strenuously objects to manual training 
in the public schools, is perhaps under this erroneous 
impression, for he qualifies his objections by saying : " Of 
course, I could take no exception to all that may be said 
in favor of technical and industrial schools, standing 
beside the public schools and carrying on this work of 
education — giving to our youth technical and special train- 
ing for industrial pursuits. That is what we have got to 
do in this country. We must have a system of technical 
training, and the question is. Shall we put a system into 
the public schools, as they are now organized ? " 

And Mr. MacAlister expressed his opinion to be, that 



252 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

alongside tlie high-scliool there might be a manual train- 
ing-school that should fit the pupils to enter in advance 
upon those industrial occupations that thej intended 
to follow. These gentlemen agree that industrial educa- 
tion is valuable, and that there is no objection to any 
measures for its promotion, if the schools for that purpose 
are placed by themselves. We see that things have taken 
that course already. There are at least two instances of 
that kind described in the preceding chapter — the shop 
which was fitted up for industrial instruction in the town 
of Montclair, and the room devoted to industrial art in 
the Hollingsworth Buildings, Philadelphia. They are 
both designed as accessories to the common school, sepa- 
rated from it, and yet contiguous enough to accommo- 
date the public-school children ; and the extent to which 
they have achieved success is rapidly solving the problem 
of industrial education in the United States. The question 
of manual and elementary instruction is now scarcely an 
open one, for the formula of reconciliation between them 
has at length been discovered ; and the two forces, in- 
stead of being rivals, are becoming good friends. Besides, 
it is a matter of general observation that manual training 
and ordinary teaching have been conducted in distinct 
parts of the same school for many years in Europe ; and 
that generally the effect of this has served to enlarge the 
faculties, refine the taste, to give clearness and breadth to 
the intellect, to make the character more helpful and 
self-reliant, and to start the pupils with the best prospects 
of success in the practical ends of life. Education can 
by this means be made a unit, and not a fragment. In- 
deed, this system of conamensurate education is demanded 
by reasons more imperative than those which require the 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 253 

high-school for a superior training in music, languages, 
and the courses preparatory to entering college. 

The interest felt in this question is but partially ex- 
emplified in the few schools in this country, for it is 
spreading to our business centers, and this volume might 
be filled with passages taken from recent books and mag- 
azines, from newspapers and speeches, manifesting the 
disinterested and moral activity of public intelligence 
upon the subject. 

At this point it will be convenient to consider some 
of the conflicting opinions and popular objections to in- 
dustrial education in j)ublic instruction. Many persons 
believe that it would prove of incalculable benefit to the 
community at large and to the industrial classes iu par- 
ticular, but they are all at sea as to the method to be 
adopted. Doubt, they say, exists as to the duty of the 
public to fit every young man for a trade or profession. 
The assumption that this is a work belonging to private 
effort is acquiesced in by many people who believe that 
industrial education in one way or another has become 
absolutely indispensable. Others admit that this neces- 
sity is not to be disguised; but hesitate to advise the 
teaching of trades in the public schools as impractical. 
Of all the phases in which the question has been dis- 
cussed, the latter is probably the one upon which the 
views of distinguished educators have differed the most ; 
and while they express a unanimous opinion in favor of 
teaching industry, many claim that it ought not to be 
introduced into the elementary schools, because, they 
say, the subjects now taught fill all the time devoted to 
study, and it would be productive of no benefit to sup- 
plant any of them by industrial training, and that there 



254 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

is no time to carry out such training without sacrificing 
some of the important branches of general education 
[ss^hich would be more useful to the pupils than any 
jlittle they might learn as apprentices. They also urge 
that, even if there were time without infringing upon 
other studies, what kind of trades would you select to 
be taught — should it be the plane, the file, the chisel, or 
the shuttle ? And where would be the room for the 
bench, the lathe, the anvil, or the loom ? "Where can be 
found a master capable of teaching the use of these tools, 
and of many others ? It is true, say these objectors, in 
case of necessity, the use of the spade and the rake might 
be introduced into rural schools ; and of course the use 
of the needle should not be neglected in girls' schools, be- 
cause, whatever their position, all women should become 
seamstresses for their own families. Another objection 
to the introduction of manual instruction into the ele- 
mentary schools is its great cost. The necessary enlarge- 
ment of the school, the tools and machines (to be renewed 
at every improvement), and the raw material (which 
would be lost if unskillf ully made up), would be sources of 
enormous expense. These objections were urged before 
the French Imperial Commission to examine the technical 
schools of the empire ; but they appear to have made but 
slight impression, and are now almost entirely forgotten 
in the brilliant success of the industrial schools which 
have been since established. 

There is undoubtedly a very sincere conviction, ex- 
pressed in a variety of ways, that although industrial 
education is highly important, there is yet considerable 
diversity of opinion whether it should hold a position in 
the public-school system. Even as powerful an advo- 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 255 

cate of manual training as Mr. Stetson was induced to 
declare that the introduction of systematic manual labor 
into public schools appeared to be a thing of altogether 
doubtful expediency. He adds, however, that in appren- 
tice-schools — schools attached to workshops and manufact- 
ures — as it is the leading object of these schools to teach 
practical application, systematic manual labor should, of 
course, form the leading feature of the instruction given. 
He concludes by observing that there can be no doubt that 
a certain amount of manual labor, especially if it shows 
the practical application of the theory which the student 
is acquiring, does not retard but decidedly promotes his 
progress in theoretical knowledge. 

It is impossible, says Dr. White, who is at the head of 
a college of science and industry, for the public school to 
teach a tithe of its pupils the pursuits or occupations by 
which they are to earn a living ; that of the one hundred 
and seventy-two occupations classed in the census of 1870 
as manufactures and mechanical and mining industries, 
not a score can be taught in a school-shop; that the 
teaching of a few trades to all pupils would crowd those 
pursuits with workmen and reduce the compensation of 
skilled labor to the wages of common laborers, and would 
glut those occupations, and leave many skilled workmen 
without employment; and that the teaching of handi- 
craft in the schools would give nine tenths of the pupils 
skill which they would never use in after-life, or use only 
incidentally ; and much more to the same effect. 

Recent examples should teach us to beware of objec- 
tions such as these, when the prospects of industrial im- 
provement are too abundant to lead us into speculative 
error. Such schools flourish in Europe, especially in those 



256 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

countries where tliej are sustained at the public expense. 
While the United States has made greater provision for 
general instruction than any other nation, she is far be- 
hind all others in the successful prosecution of indus- 
trial education ; and it is singular that, in a country like 
this, which claims the glory of being the working-man's 
friend jpar excellence^ it should do so much less for his in- 
dustrial training than Austria or Russia, than Germany 
or Switzerland. 

These are understood to be the leading objections, and 
it is believed they are stated in a form as near as pos- 
sible to that in which they are expressed by those who en- 
tertain them. They deserve respectful attention, because 
they are the views of some of the most earnest friends of 
both general and industrial education. We are aware 
that these important considerations have been already can- 
vassed successfully by men entitled to be heard, from 
their practical connection with the subject ; and the au- 
thor will, therefore, content himself with stating some gen- 
eral observations only, that almost arise spontaneously in 
reply. 

In regard to the great variety of mechanical pursuits 
and operations, and the expense that would be involved 
if manual training prevailed in the public schools, and that 
it would interfere with other studies deemed essential to 
a general education, let it be remembered that it is to 
form part of a system in which the training of the mind is 
to go hand in hand with general training in the rudiments 
of industry, including a knowledge of the mechanical 
principles underlying all trades, and a proficiency in the 
shaping and use of tools. The time of the children will 
be occupied in the ordinary kinds of lessons, but during 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 257 

some portion of tlie school-hours they will work something 
in the manner of apprentices, but with this difference, 
that they will be instructed while at such work in the 
theory and principles of their work. In other words, they 
will acquire technical knowledge and practical mannipula- 
tion to a degree high enough to enable them to find lu- 
crative employment in some useful calling upon leaving 
school. The instruction should be limited at the outset, 
and be of the least expensive character ; and no trade in 
particular will be taught, but the pupils will be made ac- 
quainted generally with the use of tools and machinery. 
In carpentry, for instance, there might be taught the use 
of the saw, the plane, and the lathe, in a shop costing little 
more than the materials for its construction ; and perhaps, 
in many instances, in another part of the school-building 
itself. The processes for working in metal could be 
taught in a manner as inexpensive as those in wood, ex- 
cept casting. A steam-engine and some practical hand- 
ling of tools and machines, two or three hours in the work- 
shop twice a week, with a skilled workman for instructor, 
would make an excellent beginning. 

Instruction in the use of tools is referred to by Mr. 
Philip Magnus in the following terms : 

There is another subject of instruction which, having 
regard to the future occupations of the pupils, ought, 
in the opinion of many educational authorities, to be 
introduced into public elementary schools, viz, instruction 
in the use of the more ordinary tools found in every work- 
shop. The advocates of this proposal do not desire that 
lessons in handicraft- work should occupy any part of the 
time that is now devoted to other subjects of instruction, 
neither do they suggest that such teaching should take 
the place of apprenticeship to any trade, nor do they ex- 



258 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

pect even that it would sensibly diminisli the period of 
such apprenticeship. They look to the disciplinary rather 
than to the directly useful influence of such teaching, and 
they recognize in it many distinct advantages. Following 
on the Kindergarten system of handicraft exercise, this 
instruction would help still further to train the hand to 
the perception of differences of size, form, roughness, and 
other qualities, which the sense of touch, guided by the 
muscular sense and sight, enable us to appreciate ; and in 
this way it would serve as a real discipline and as a sense- 
exercise. Morally, it would teach children, at an early 
age, that there is nothing derogatory in hand-work. On 
the contrary, by making workshop teaching a part of the 
school-instruction, the pupil would be trained to recognize 
the dignity of labor, and would come to understand that 
it is as honorable to earn one's living by the use of the 
file as of the pen. M. Jules Ferry, in laying the founda- 
tion-stone of a professional school at Yierzon, one day 
this month (1881), is reported to have said : " Caste-ideas 
would vanish when tools were found in schools along- 
side of maps and books ; the nobleness of manual labor 
would be perceived, and concord would be spread." 

In pursuance of this same idea, let us also remember 
that many of the useful arts are ruled not only by similar 
principles, but by mechanical apparatus of analogous power 
and mode of operation. This is practically exemplified 
by the use of the lathe in turning, whether in wood or 
iron, or by hand or steam-power ; and " so in fitting it 
always depends upon a correct eye and manual skill ; and 
the individual who can fit a piece of iron by means of the 
file will soon fit a piece of wood with the aid of plane 
and chisel." Attention should undoubtedly be employed 
to press as many of these general mechanical movements 
as possible into the method of instruction, in order to ob- 
tain a good execution in manual operations which resem- 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCUOOLS. 259 

ble each other in different trades. Mechanical philosophy 
teaches that all the simple mechanical powers are six in 
number ; namely, the lever, wheel and axle, pulley, wedge, 
inclined plane, and screw ; and that these simple powers 
are so adjusted as to produce all the movements and com- 
binations in all the vast variety of intricate machinery 
which men have invented and constructed.* What is 
true of these simple powers applies with the same force 
to the tools which men usually employ in their labor. It 
is therefore contended that a true and full knowledge of 
these simple powers, and a rudimentary acquaintance with 
tools in a general way, would be just the kind of informa- 
tion to enable the pupils to achieve their place in society 
and maintain successfully the battle of life. Instructions 
even of this elementary character in the practice of man- 
ual industry would have changed the conditions of tens 
of thousands in our cities, who have not the skill or ability 
to work, and who consequently become the mere parasites 
of society. 

There is no great mystery about the trades. They 
are much easier acquired, and almost in a shorter space 
of time, than it takes to learn the game of chess. They 
are all ready made. The machines and tools are invented ; 
and if a young man understands how to use and how to 
construct them, but a very short time will be sufficient to 
make him a good workman, and he can turn his hand to 
any trade he likes best, without wearying himself out in 
the repulsive drudgery of a long apprenticeship. The 
delicate touch and the dexterous hand will come with 
practice and experience ; and he will execute and measure 
his work with the fine inspiration of its philosophy and 

* Comstock, " Philosophy," p. 98. 



260 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

ingenuity. In the present organization of our industries, 
there is no danger that the trades will become glutted, 
and that the standard of wages will be reduced by the 
competition of skilled workers, for, with intelligence in 
the head and the hand of labor, occupations will multiply 
with every step of human advancement. The fountain 
of industrial art is inexhaustible. The resistless and 
matchless progress of science is always giving out some- 
thing more to learn and something more to do, and there 
is no limit to improvement. Think of the ample oppor- 
tunities for work that spring almost every day from the 
increasing knowledge of electric light and motors, from 
electro-magnetism and electrotype, the telegraph, the tel- 
ephone, and other developments. Scarcely a day passes 
without the announcement of a new process or principle 
in nature. Skilled employments are in their infancy. 
Applied science and human ingenuity are ever elaborating 
from the magazines of Nature new forces, unknown but 
yesterday, and furnishing illimitable prospects for human 
industry. And, in the face of all this increasing demand, 
American workmen are scarcer every year. The tend- 
ency is toward the genteel pursuits that are crammed with 
young men who can do nothing, and the want of indus- 
trial skill is such that this process is likely to go on. 
Every country in Europe sends its floods of skilled labor 
to take their places and " reduce wages " with a venge- 
ance, and at the same time reducing our own children to 
idleness and its train of evils. The affected anxiety of 
those who are fearful that industrial teaching in the pub- 
lic schools would crowd any particular trade, is evidently 
neither pertinent nor reasonable. It is altogether too re- 
mote a probability, and the alternative now presented is. 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 261 

whether we shall adhere to the existing system of idleness 
and want, and the misery and crime which inevitably 
result, to the exclusion of a beneficent fabric of practi- 
cal education and its attendant blessings of wealth, skill, 
and prosperity. Does it not seem like taxing our patience 
to reflect further on these objections ? But let us proceed. 
The country is full of people who live on others' labor, 
principally because they know nothing of honest work ; 
and we are not left to speculate upon their debasement. 
Idleness is their scheme of life. One of the best means 
of eliminating this element would be the complementary 
training of mind and hand, to fit them for their duties to 
society, and so develop their natural capacity, by even a 
few months of rudimentary instruction in the practice 
of tools and machinery. "Where we have sown in neglect, 
we must expect to reap the consequences. 

It is seen that the plan of manual training does not 
contemplate the erection of huge workshops filled with 
the finest and most expensive machinery, in the first in- 
stance ; or to secure as instructors the greatest mechani- 
cal artists of the age ; or to teach all the different kinds 
of trade in a special manner, and perhaps no trade at all 
in particular. But to teach those branches which will be 
auxiliary to all practical labor, under instructors of the or- 
dinary school, and a part of the time by specialists, skilled 
artisans, engineers, and manufacturers, in shops suited to 
the practice, and at such hours as will not interfere with 
the school-room or its general studies. The local circum- 
stances of the school are also to be considered. It is to 
be co-ordinate, and equally entitled to its hours of instruc- 
tion. The subjects to be taught must be carefully con- 
siderered, and no doubt much will depend upon the arts 



262 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

and industries of the place and tlie coexistence of similar 
institutions. Much excellent work can be accomplished 
without disgusting the children, or expecting them to be- 
come ideal artisans. Moderate instructions can be pro- 
vided at the outset, and such as will complement the other 
studies of the pupil by showing their intimate relation. 
Study and work will go hand in hand in honorable com- 
panionship, and drawing, mechanics, mathematics, and 
design will be wrought out in the different objects upon 
which the hand of labor is employed. And when it is 
seen that intuition is blind until the hand has made it 
a fact, and that ideas are void until they are embodied in 
some potential form through the trained perfections of 
man's physical powers, the pupils will be imbued with a 
personal and disinterested appreciation of the worth and 
dignity of labor. 

Technical instruction and hand-work with tools and 
machines, of a general character, will prepare the pupils 
for a very great variety of trades, especially in the me- 
chanic arts. Mr. Leland's industrial school for hand-train- 
ing in the minor arts gives a sufficient preparation to ena- 
ble those attending his classes to practice efficiently in fifty 
or a hundred of those arts after a few days' application, 
and he also observes that all branches of industry allied 
to ornament are very easy, and can generally be so far 
mastered in a day by anybody who can draw as to enable 
him to produce a perfectly satisfactory result. The same 
is undoubtedly true of industrial art generally ; for if, in 
addition to a knowledge of drawing and design, a young 
man is also scientifically instructed in the use of tools and 
in the action of machinery, it can require not more than 
a few days or weeks at the most to fit him in the com- 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 263 

pletest manner for any branch of industry in tlie mechan- 
ic arts. There are several trades which might require a 
special training, and for which special schools could be 
provided in the course of time ; for let us remember that 
institutions grow. There is no more striking example 
of this adage than the contrast presented by the splen- 
did condition of the common schools, and the period 
when the teachers boarded round among the parents of 
the pupils. A community of skilled workmen cannot be 
built up in a day ; the foundation must be laid in techni- 
cal training and in the gradual process of experience and 
invention. And this requires much time, but it affords 
the best support of the state, because it administers to the 
welfare and comfort of all other classes, especially in a 
country going so fast in the direction of commerce and the 
productive arts. It may be said of such a community, as 
was sung by Goldsmith concerning the rural population 
of his own land : 

111 fares the land, to hastening ills a prey, 
Where wealth accumulates and men decay ; 
Princes and lords may flourish, or may fade ; 
A breath can make them, as a breath has made ; 
But a bold peasantry, their country's pride. 
When once destroyed, can never be supplied. 

Just here it would not be amiss again to notice the 
success which attends industrial schools established by law 
in Belgium, Germany, France, and Switzerland, in edu- 
cating the people who are to live by their brains through 
the work of their hands. In Mr. Stetson's book on tech- 
nical education is a statement of the testimony of M. 
Kossat, Doctor of Science, and head-master of an indus- 
trial school at Charleville, France, before the Imperial 



264 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

Commission, who testifies substantially that the practical 
are in no way injurious to the theoretical studies ; on the 
contrary, in the subjects of descriptive geometiy and in- 
dustrial drawing, manual labor seems to stimulate the pu- 
pils. He states that in his school practical work in the shops 
and laboratory occupies two hours a day, and that the pu- 
pils beg that the time be extended. Many of them possess 
great skill. The shops and all the works are under the 
direction of a civil engineer, and under him are three 
foremen — one in the fitting, another in the smith's, and a 
third in the carpenter's shop. The proceeds of the labor 
of the pupils, if any, go toward the maintenance of the 
workshops. In the fitting-shop, the most skillful pupils 
are occupied in putting together a steam-engine to drive 
the machinery ; others are making models and parts of 
machinery. There are thirty carpenters and fifty smiths, 
besides the pupils who are occupied with manipulations 
in the laboratory. 

This description applies more particularly to the indus- 
trial school where trades are taught, and will answer for 
hundreds of others in the countries named. I select it 
for the purpose of demonstrating by an eminent example 
that the mental and physical powers relating to skill may 
be concurrently educated with advantage to both, and 
without realizing any of the fearful evils prognosticated 
by our American objectors. If it be said that this would 
not apply to elementary schools, I appeal to those of 
France, where it does. 

It appears from the report of the Royal Commissioners 
on Technical Instruction, mentioned in the last chapter, 
that the ordinary curriculum of instruction in the French 
elementary schools comprises reading, writing, arithmetic, 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 265 

grammar, geography, the history of France, drawing, and 
music, and it is strictly carried out in all the large towns ; 
but they add that instruction in manual work has of late 
been introduced into a considerable number of these 
schools in Paris. The manual instruction begins at the 
age of ten years, and for the present is optional, and is 
given before and after the usual school-hours. At the 
time the commission visited Paris there were twenty-three 
primary schools to which workshops had been attached, 
ten others were on the point of being opened, and prepara- 
tions were being made for attaching workshops to twelve 
others. The rooms for instruction in drawing and the 
workshops in these schools are well ventilated and light- 
ed. Special inspectors determine the quantity of work 
to be done, and judge of its quality. 

The municipal authorities of several other towns were 
giving a favorable consideration to the introduction of 
manual labor into the ordinary elementary schools, after 
the example of Paris ; and at Rennes and Marseilles ar- 
rangements had been made for teaching manual work in 
their elementary schools. 

There has been but one elementary school in Paris in 
which complete trade-teaching is combined with ordinary 
instruction. This is the communal school of the Eue 
Tournefort. There are three hundred and sixty children 
in the school. Trade-instruction commences at the age of 
ten years, and continues for three years. In the third year 
the work is specialized, some of the children being taught 
modeling and carving ; others, joiner's work and cabinet- 
making ; others, again, forging and fitting. In the high- 
est class they have eighteen hours per week in the shops, 
besides instruction in drawing, geometry, and natural sci- 



266 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

ence. The children on leaving school are generally pre- 
pared to practice a trade, and find ready employment. 
So strongly are the pupils interested, that technical work- 
shops have been fitted up in many others of the Paris 
schools during the holidays, to enable the pupils on leav- 
ing to become skilled workmen after a short apprentice- 
ship. 

The manual instruction thus introduced into element- 
ary schools is confined to advanced drawing from models, 
and the use of the ordinary tools in working wood and 
metal, without attempting to teach special trades. They 
are therefore not to be confounded with the apprentice- 
ship-schools proper, of which that of La Yalette is the 
type ; or like the great school at Creuzot, to form skilled 
workmen for the business firm by which it has been estab- 
lished ; or like the watch-makers' school in Paris, designed 
for a particular manufacture. In this connection, we 
ought not to overlook recent legislation in France relating 
to handicraft in elementary schools. The first article of 
the law of 1880 places apprenticeship-schools in the cat- 
egory of primary instruction. A commission appointed 
to prepare a programme of instruction conformable to the 
provisions of the act, considered that teaching particular 
trades should be avoided in the primary schools, but rec- 
ommended a series of manual exercises intended to de- 
velop the children's skill of hand — such as object-lessons, 
drawing, modeling, and the characteristics of wood and 
the common metals ; and upon reaching the upper class, 
at the age of twelve, in addition to these exercises, the 
pupils should study, two hours per day, various tools used 
in working w^ood, and the construction of articles in that 
material, making the lessons both practical and theoreti- 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 267 

cal ; also the study of tools used in working metals in the 
same manner, with exercising in filing, smoothing, and 
finishing rough forgings or castings. The practical work 
is carried on in shops annexed to the schools, and is well 
calculated to discover the special aptitude of the pupil 
for the work for which he is best fitted, whether requiring 
precision or taste, or for trades dependent upon mathe- 
matical knowledge, and, if not gifted with such excel- 
lences, whether he can perform useful work requiring less 
ability. 

After the primary, comes the apprenticeship-school 
proper, in which it is proposed only to teach the parent- 
industries, or those which resemble each other in the tools 
they employ and the mechanical principles they involve. 
The superior primary school is the last of the series for 
technological education of a high order. 

Thus we see that France felt itself under the same 
necessity as its neighbors to make the utmost exertion to 
preserve its useful arts, and to increase their number to 
the greatest extent possible. Almost every trade was 
suffering from the inevitable decay of the old system of 
learning it. The following is the tenor of a passage from 
the report of H. Tolman, senator, to the Prefect of the 
Seine : 

Again, the workshops where private industries are 
conducted no longer, except in a few rare instances, adopt 
the system of a true apprenticeship. The majority of 
manufacturers have given up taking apprentices ; the 
lads they employ are set to a special class of work, often 
of the most insignificant kind, receive remuneration from 
the first, and, by mutual consent of the parents and em- 
ployer, the contract of apprenticeship is abandoned for 
one of hire. 



268 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

A revolution of tliis nature in the methods of produc- 
tion threatens above all the prosperity of French industrv, 
and more particularly the welfare of that of Paris. 

Now, it is more particularly in the parent-industries, 
comprising various trades or specialties having numer- 
ous points of resemblance, the work in which is of a simi- 
lar character and renders necessary, to a great extent, the 
same class of tools, that the system of apprenticeship is 
gradually disappearing, while employers are powerless to 
remedy the evil, however sincere may be their desire to 
do so. For these great industries, the only means of 
raising the standard of technical knowledge is the estab- 
lishment of apprenticeship-schools. 

Animated with a desire to avert a condition so ruin- 
ous to the moral and material interests of the people, the 
city of Paris and the Government of France have re- 
sorted to the policy of industrial education, as altogether 
the best remedy which experience and practical results 
have yet devised. Opinions to the same effect have been 
formed on this side of the Atlantic by many persons who 
are fully competent to form an opinion from having de- 
voted themselves with the greatest attention to this ques- 
tion. Take, for example, the conclusions of the Boston 
School Committee, perhaps the most distinguished author- 
ity on educational questions in the United States, and 
who report that they believe industrial training, or the 
training of the hand and eye, and thereby the mind as 
well, is an invaluable element of education, and deserves 
recognition and support ; and, while they express an opin- 
ion adverse to teaching actual trades in elementary schools 
in a complete manner or extent, still they recommend 
teaching the minor arts as in the industrial schools in 
Cambridge, Gloucester, and Boston, wherein it is proved 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 269 

that courses in industrial training may be devised suited 
for different ages, and that such training might begin in 
the primary schools, and be continued in the grammar- 
schools, possibly even further, to correspond with the 
literary training given in the high-schools. As to whether 
the proposed industrial training would interfere with the 
other studies, they quote an authority on the " half-time " 
system of education, which says, " There is a special mu- 
tual influence between the school and the factory which 
improves the quality of the work done in both." And, 
in conclusion, the committee express a feeling in favor of 
introducing into the public school ample and fundamental 
industrial training, for they believe that such training is 
an invaluable element of education, suited to develop and 
help all, whatever their future career. 

These views are of momentous importance. They 
come from the commercial and industrial emporium of 
that part of the country which is most interested in the 
subject, and they recognize the want of industrial train- 
ing which now exists and oppresses industry, but they also 
recognize the necessity and feasibility of introducing it 
as a fundamental element in public instruction. 

Mr. Edward T. Steel, President of the Board of Pub- 
lic Education for the City of Philadelphia, in his annual 
report of 1881, is not less emphatic in his devotion to in- 
dustrial education. In his opinion, manual and intellect- 
ual education should be regarded as equally necessary to 
the welfare and safety of the state, and should command 
equal opportunity of acquisition ; and it seems more essen- 
tial to him that the knowledge of a trade or occupation 
should be acquired before arriving at manhood, for intel- 
lectual training may cover every period of a lifetime. 



270 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

He holds that there is no kind of ignorance more to be 
feared by our social and political institutions than that 
which knows no handicraft or special occupation upon 
which it may depend for the necessaries of life. When il- 
literacy is joined with untutored hands, a type of human- 
ity is reached more dangerous than the uncivilized subjects 
of barbarous tribes. He alludes to the public disorders, 
when recently the most desperate and reckless of that 
class assailed the business enterprises of the country ; and 
to the fact that few of those who composed the alarming 
mobs had any knowledge of skilled employment, when it 
is equally true that during that season of business stagna- 
tion, as a rule, the regular trades and skilled occupations 
afforded a fair living support. The fact, he says, is be- 
coming better understood that, unless education embraces 
manual as well as mental training, it will fail for want of 
thoroughness, and that, when the intellectual attainments 
w^hich properly belong to the trades are made to lead into 
them, they will rank first among the occupations as prac- 
tical results due to the above theories and principles. 

These observations come from the right quarter, for 
the growth and riches of Philadelphia depend almost en- 
tirely upon her varied and numerous industries. She has 
become great and populous from the spoils of labor. 
There was a fitness in her owning the first school of art- 
industry established in any American city — that already 
adverted to in the HoUingsworth Building — which has 
seized upon public favor, and is becoming identified with 
the needs and tendencies of her useful arts. Without 
doubt its influence will be great, for it will lead to similar 
institutions, as the living representation of its industry. 



CHAPTEE XIY. 

Application of experience — Speculative improvement tardy — Franklin's dis- 
covery not applied for one hundred years — Industrial education in the 
United States rendered simple — Classification of industrial schools into 
three kinds — Each described — The developing plan of Ruggles — The 
one for teaching mechanic art recommended, and the reasons stated — 
Public education a fundamental maxim — It ought to be for the great- 
est number — Manual training in public schools — Law in Massachusetts 
— The great body of the people employed — Education should, therefore, 
form an ability for the business of life — Intellectual training at the 
expense of manual and social virtue — Division of labor, and develop- 
ment of art — The children and their employment — Mr. MacAlister's 
address — Inexpensiveness of industrial education shown — Absolute ne- 
cessity of manual training — Education at public expense — Reliance on 
the state — Form of government depends upon people — How children 
are taught — In an ignorant society man becomes debased — Education 
should be for useful purpose — Multiplicity of employments, and the 
inducement to self-perfection — Training the great mass of workers a 
matter of life or death — Illustrations — Its proper place allotted it — 
Richard Grant White — Special trades not favored in public schools 
— Working-people not opposed to the manual element in education — 
The reason why they should not be unfriendly to it — Spring Garden In- 
stitute — Examples of working-men receiving instruction — Night-schools 
attended by working-people for studies relating to industry — Encourage- 
ment from extensive firms and corporations illustrated by an example 
— Opportunities for industrial education — Industrial establishments 
willing to aid — Object of industrial education — Wendell Phillips — Lord 
Brougham's remark — Professor Smith's views — Views of the Boston 
School Committee — Expenditure in the £cole municipal (TApprentis — 
Effect on Paris — Graduates of our schools — Professor Runkle's views 
— Mechanic art of wide application — Confers mental discipline and in- 
creases the mental powers. 

I HAVE thus glanced at the experience of this and 
other countries, to show that theoretical views on this sub- 



272 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

ject liave been practically illustrated in a great variety of 
examples. Induction is an application of recognized facts 
of greater or less generality. A mere logical demonstra- 
tion of a question lias a charm for the mind because it is 
so satisfactory, but an experimental verification fills both 
the mind and the senses with a living proof which sur- 
passes simple reason or logic, because it involves the facts 
of sensibility as well as those of intelligence. When we 
rely solely upon the speculative powers of the mind, im- 
provements creep tardily along, notwithstanding man's 
ingenuity or necessities. It was not until the lapse of one 
hundred years after Franklin had discovered the perfect 
conductibility of the electric fluid that a galvanic current 
was found to transmit signals at a distance. The best 
method of practical wisdom is to profit by the experience 
of others, and industrial education in the United States is 
rendered a problem much more simple by the comparative 
ease with which it has been introduced into public schools 
elsewhere, and by the gratifying results which have at- 
tended it : they go far to overthrow the objections set 
down against its practicability. 

Industrial schools ought to be distinguished into three 
kinds or classes, according to the object for which they 
are intended : 

First. If instruction is to be given with I'eference to 
a particular trade or trades, the studies should be special, 
and such as belong to an apprenticeship proper. There 
are a number of such schools abroad, but it is doubted 
whether there is one of this kind in the United States, 
unless in the Indian schools at Hampton and Carlisle. 

Second, is the art-industry school, or such as give in- 
struction in art as applied to industry. This is more espe- 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 273 

cially devoted to drawing, designing, modeling, and the 
natural sciences. These promote the general culture of 
the people, and improve manufactures by making them 
artistic and salable. Within a few years the economic 
value of such schools has been a marked feature in Brit- 
ish industry, and has remedied imperfections in every 
branch of useful art. 

Third and lastly come those which are not special, but 
prepare the pupils for work generally, according to their 
ability and inclination, throughout the entire industrial 
field. Here they are taught in the principles of mech- 
anism and in the tools commonly used in all the trades. 
Perhaps it is difiicult to define what constitutes an indus- 
trial education of this last kind in a public school ; but 
one may state, in a general way, that it means a school 
apart from the ordinary one, where all things bearing upon 
industrial pursuits are taught. This includes the proper- 
ties of bodies, the rudiments of natural philosophy, draw- 
ing, and design. There must also be shops where techni- 
cal knowledge is acquired by practical instruction with 
machinery and tools, beginning with the easiest and least 
expensive, and enlarging the work until all the leading 
principles and employments in what Senator Tolain so 
aptly terms the parent-industries have been generalized 
in the course of instruction. The pupil, when this is 
done, can turn to any kind of business for which he is 
most fitted, and a very few days will be sufficient to spe- 
cialize his work in any of the ordinary trades of a mechan- 
ic. We are learning experience in the practical working 
of this class of school by what we have noticed in Phila- 
delphia, Montclair, Washington, and elsewhere, for there 

we find industrial schools, if not in name at least in 
]3 



274 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

reality ; and they show that these studies are suited to J 
children of twelve years and upward, and even excite i 
their zeal and devotion in the work. The theorists who i 
call for specialists will be disappointed, because an artisan | 
of a particular trade is not turned out. This is not the ' 
plan of the school. It professes to furnish the pupil only 
with such general knowledge as will give him the key to j 
all his abilities in any department of work where he can | 
labor the best. The industrial field is before him ; nor 
will he hold the tenure of his pursuit by the thread of a 
single accomplishment which interdicts him from all other 
vocations. On the contrary, he can exercise the essen- ; 
tial skill of many employments, and may improve the one ; 
to which he devotes himself by reason of his technic in- 
formation. There is little danger that he will ever pre- \ 
sent the unedifying spectacle of a toady, a Bohemian, or 
an impecunious journeyman. It is believed that this third ; 
kind of school has many distinguishing merits. It has ! 
the great advantage of superiority in point of simplicity, 
and of facility in general arrangement in practical opera- 
tions, and is probably the form best adapted for manual i 
training in the public schools of the United States. | 
It is proper here to notice the Developing school and ' 
the Manual Institute suggested by Mr. S. P. Ruggles, i 
which have attracted the favorable attention of the Ameri- j 
can Social Science Association. The first of these is a I 
fully equipped school-shop in which the pupil is to ac- • 
quire an accurate knowledge of the principles and opera- , 
tions of all trades, by means of which practice his pecul- ' 
iar aptitudes will be developed, and he can then be well ! 
advised of the profession for which he is best suited, j 
After this, the pupil is to enter the Manual Institute, 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 275 

where he will be instructed in his chosen occupation in 
the most effectual and profitable manner. The first of 
these is only a beginning to lead the pupil to understand 
himself, and to give a right direction to his choice of a 
profession ; then the Manual Institute combines with this 
a special training of all his faculties in acquiring that par- 
ticular trade. ^' 

* The developing school is described by Mr. Ruggles, the originator, as 
follows : 

" Imagine, if you please, one very large room, with a steam-engine and 
boiler in the middle of it, so that all pupils that have any taste for the man- 
agement of steam, or steam-engines, could examine every point, and readily 
understand it. Then a carpenter's bench, with a variety of tools, to show 
how that work is done; then, perhaps, turning-lathes, to show how the 
wocd-turning business is performed ; then, with the aid of black-boards and 
carving-tools, it might be seen how drawing is done. We should also have 
planing - machines, lathes, upright drills, jig-saws, etc., to represent the 
machinist business. Foundry- work could be shown by having the usual 
fixtures for sand, and two and three part flasks for molding; the casting 
could be done in soft metals, as lead, zinc, or tin, which could be rc-used, 
as the whole art in foundry-work consists in the different modes of mold- 
ing. We would have a printing-press, type, and fixtures, to illustrate the 
printing business. 

"Mason- work, the laying of brick (to some extent), stucco-work, the 
working in plaster of Paris, could be shown ; the whole room being filled 
with educational instruments of instruction, such as three different heights 
of barometers, the bellows-valve, the gyroscope, the ball on the top of a jet 
of water, the steam-injector — all to lead out the thoughts of the pupil, ena- 
bling the superintendent to ascertain the true bent or natural genius of the 
youth, so that he should be sent to the right department in the Manual In- 
stitute, and thoroughly instructed in his chosen art." 

The Manual Institute is mentioned in these terms by him : 

" As soon as it should be ascertained by the Developing school for what 
kind of business the pupil is b§st fitted, he would be sent to the Manual 
Institute where his chosen trade was taught, and be more thoroughly in- 
structed in two years' daily instruction than by six or seven years under 
the old apprentice system. 

*' A machine-shop in the Manual Institute, fitted up for the purpose of 



276 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

Having thus stated the different forms of industrial 
schools which seem to have any claim to consideration, 
the question occurs, which one of them would be most 
suitable for general use in our public schools. It is 
claimed that the last one of the three classified above has 
several advantages for that purpose. It seems quite clear 
that the choice ought to fall on that one, or on the plan 
suggested by Mr. Buggies. A careful comparison will 
show, I think, that, while the latter has great intrinsic 
value, the former has the merit of simplicity, inexpen- 
siveness, and organization. These are considerations of 
no small importance with those who are willing to pro- 
mote industrial education, but do not deem it prudent or 
expedient greatly to increase the public burden, already 
so great. It is obvious that two schools, as contemplated 
in the developing plan, would double the cost and ex- 
pense, or at least increase them to such a degree as to 
render it appalKng to the constituency. It is too institu- 
tional and cumbersome for a beginning. In the other 
school the same ends will be secured, for the leading 
principles of business will be carefully pursued and 

teaching a trade, would contain every tool and appliance that is used in 
any machine-shop, so that the student would become acquainted with every 
manner of doing work, and with the management of every kind of tool or 
device used in machine-shops, doing every variety of machine- work ; and 
each pupil would be taught to make the whole, and put together every ma- 
chine or article that was manufactured. 

" In the Manual Institute the pupil would advance from a lower degree 
of instruction to a higher as rapidly as his thorough knowledge and good 
workmanship would justify. The instructors would be paid a satisfactory 
salary, and not be permitted to make merchandise of the time of the stu- 
dents. All articles made by the students could be disposed of by sale, and 
the proceeds appropriated toward defraying the expenses of the school- 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 277 

wrought into the understanding by familiar illustrations 
and repeated exercises, and the eye and hand trained to 
habits of accuracy and skillful manipulation, until it will 
require but little reflection to discern the peculiar bent of 
the pupil's genius, and the profession most appropriate 
for his abilities. This will save a world of expense, of 
labor and inconvenience, and at the same time will be 
fully sufficient to qualify him to enter upon his business 
with the best possible means of success. While the de- 
veloping plan is fuller in its preliminary exercises, these 
are soon specialized to a particular calling ; the other is 
far superior in its economy of time and means, and in that 
fullness and generality which characterize its arrangement 
in teaching all the principles and operations analogous to 
each other in mechanic art. Surely the pupils would have 
a better chance in life than if they were only accomplished 
in one direction. 

I have incidentally remarked upon the duty of the 
State to establish and maintain schools for industrial edu- 
cation by appropriations of public revenue. It seems de- 
sirable to advert to the subject again in order that the 
legal status of such schools may be fairly understood. 
That the public ought to provide for the education 
of the people is a fundamental maxim in this country. 
It is confirmed in numerous State Constitutions, and is 
consecrated in our jurisprudence. The general principle 
being settled, the question is asked, What kind of edu- 
cation ought to be provided, and how far ought it to go 
in improving the children ? The answer is obvious. It 
ought to be for the greatest number, and to consist of 
such branches of study as can be applied for some practi- 
cal and useful purpose in the life to which the pupil is 



278 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY; 

destined, and in the duties of a citizen to wLich the law 
invites him. It is safe to say that this is scarcely sup- 
plied by what is now understood to be a common-school 
education ; and it is for the voters in the cities and school 
districts to determine whether the instruction afforded 
to their children may not be varied and extended to 
branches of knowledge of a practical and manual charac- 
ter. Unless the Legislature has restricted the studies to be 
taught, the people through the school boards or trustees 
have a right to furnish manual training to all the youth 
in the schools, or at least to put it within the reach of all 
classes who may desire it. In Massachusetts, the amend- 
ments to laws relating to public schools authorize the 
city council of any city and any town to establish and 
maintain one or more industrial schools, and to raise and 
appropriate the money necessary to render them efficient ; 
and, no doubt, the Legislatures of other States would feel 
bound to conform to any popular demand for similar en- 
actments. The present appears to be the opportune mo- 
ment to call public attention, which is already aroused, 
more particularly to the subject, since industry is in a 
transition state, and some means must be devised by which 
it can be taught in view of present conditions and future 
prospects. 

The great body of the people have to spend most of 
their lives in the exercise of some employment. The 
number of those who can exist without work is inconsid- 
erable. Aside from the common laborers, all the others 
become artisans, manufacturers, merchants, farmers, or 
flock into the professions. Education should, therefore, 
be directed to form in them the ability and knowledge 
which their business life requires, or at least to such an 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 279 

extent as the art of teaching will admit of. It should 
render them capable of exerting their intelligence and 
training in the situation they are to occupy. The lawyer, 
the physician, and the engineer gain instant assistance 
from their studies, but the school-boy reaps scarcely a 
personal advantage, for the training of his intellectual 
powers has been carried on at the expense of his manual 
and social virtues ; and on leaving school he runs to and 
fro, seeking something or anything to do, scarcely a self- 
existent being. 

The prodigious development in the useful arts has in- 
troduced a division of labor almost endless in its variety, 
with an infinity of occupations, and such as require an 
extraordinary degree of technic knowledge in both the 
hands and the head ; and the improvement of all manu- 
factured articles has undergone a surprising development 
in every country with which we have extended commer- 
cial relations. The rude system of apprenticeship has been 
superseded by technical training. What are you going 
to do with the children ? Their parents are generally 
poor, and have not much time or means to spare for their 
education. And, perhaps, in nine cases out of ten, they 
can but illy provide for their subsistence during infancy. 
You say, send them to a trade, which many of them would 
gladly do, but for the difficulty if not impossibility in the 
present state of things in finding one. Says Mr. MacAl- 
ister, in the address already mentioned : " Stand on Cen- 
tral Bridge, in the city of Milwaukee, at six o'clock in the 
evening, and see the thousands and thousands, not only 
of boys, but also of little girls, with their baskets in their 
hands, going home from their day's work. They left 
their humble homes at six o'clock in the morning ; they 



280 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

had their luncheon with them, and at six o'clock they are 
on their way home. They have had all the education 
their parents could afford to give them." And he adds that 
this ideal form of education will not do, after all, for the 
demands of the present tim.e. Why, then, let us ask, not 
give them an opportunity to acquire, or at least to fit 
themselves for afterward acquiring, the trade or profes- 
sion by which they are to support themselves ? For a 
very small expense the public can facilitate and afford to 
the whole body of the people the means of acquiring the 
most essential parts of an industrial education. Do you 
ask what interest can the State have in furnishing to 
every child instruction that will enable him to follow a 
trade? Labor is the fundamental condition of society 
and the fountain of its intelligence and wealth. But 
perhaps the best answer is to be found in the condition of 
our industries, which can no longer prosper without the 
aid of science and art. Manual training is necessary in 
order to prevent them from falling into the hands of for- 
eigners, or their entire degeneration in our own unskilled 
management ; and it is now recognized and maintained 
in every civilized society as a most vital and important 
branch of public education. 

" The people have learned that industrial training of 
their children is the fountain of their prosperity, and pre- 
fer elementary schools to prisons, and trade and technical 
schools to workhouses and emigration, and school-rates to 
poor-rates." If the right of the State to suppress idle- 
ness as it does ignorance, and to afford a real education 
as it does an ideal one, is denied, then there is small hope 
that that work will ever be maintained by private enter- 
prise. No system of education for the body of the peo- 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 281 

pie has ever been able to exist except at the public ex- 
pense. The educational aptitude and strenuous industry 
of the American people have been paid for by taxation. 
The States have made the general laws, and local boards 
have prescribed the studies and raised the means. It is 
in vain to expect a system of industrial education unless 
either the State or the locality shall bear the expense. 
Even in a country so remarkable for its general benevo- 
lence as the United States, where thousands of individu- 
als devote their time and money to relieve distress, is it 
not to be wondered at that this philanthropy, which em- 
braces every form of charity, has done so little to promote 
industrial education, although it is founded in the intel- 
lectual, the moral, and physical worth of our nature ? 

It is said that, when everything is expected from the 
State, the temptation is very strong to demand from it 
the realization of all the hopes founded upon its " omnip- 
otent action " ; and that self-reliance and a feeling of inde- 
pendence, which produce all that is good and noble, are 
never so well assured as when each person counts least 
upon the Government. These are among the general 
opinions wliich in this country we all accept, and yet we 
must all acknowledge that no one influence prepares each 
character for an intense and vigorous individuality better 
than the education we ought to receive ; and, when this 
education is suited to the condition and wants of the peo- 
ple, they become independent beings, perfectly able to 
take care of themselves. Children cannot be made the 
bases of a system of individualism. 

The form of government depends upon the amount 
of knowledge which the people have acquired. An igno- 
rant man is incapable of a form of government based up- 



282 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

on intelligence, for it is not suited to his condition. But, 
as he grows in knowledge, he needs less and less the con- 
trol of law, until he is sufficiently advanced to enjoj in- 
stitutions which impose the least possible restraint upon 
his freedom and independence. He then displays that 
refinement and intrepidity which we contemplate with 
unspeakable sympathies. Education is now carried by 
votes of popular suffrage, and is connected with the Gov- 
ernment as the most immensely important institution 
under its care. Here the child is taught. He is helpless, 
and has everything to learn. He believes what he is told, 
and obeys without being able to exercise his own reason ; 
but as the bud contains within itself all that constitutes 
the fruit, so does he all that belongs to man. If, however, 
he is permitted to grow up into a man without instruc- 
tion, the most groveling and debasing tendencies will be 
likely to sway the whole course of his life. In a society 
where ignorance prevails one man differs but little from 
another; there can be but a limited stock of ideas to 
kindle their intelligence; each one spends his time in 
performing the drudgery of his station, and is as incapable 
of appreciating the communication of knowledge as he is 
of feeling any noble sentiment or aspiration. He becomes 
as little like a man as possible, and subsides into stoical 
indifference and stupid inactivity, or pales and trembles 
in mortal fear and superstition. Education is therefore 
dependent upon the State, which is bound to see that it is 
provided for every child that it can reach. It exerts an 
influence beyond the mere discipline of the school-room, 
in the elevation of life and character, and develops the 
peculiar characteristics and brightness of the individual. 
I take it that every part of that education should tend 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 283 

to some useful purpose, and, as nearly all of tlie pupils 
will be compelled to earn a living, it should improve the 
faculty which will render them able to meet tliis supreme 
necessity, and teach those branches of knowledge in which 
they have the deepest interest. In the great multipKcity 
of employments, and the sharp competition which they 
engender, every workman is called upon to exert his ca- 
pacity to open up new views of his art, and thus contribute 
to the progress of his industry. Invention is on the alert, 
and every man has the strongest inducements to self-per- 
fection. The artisan is no longer expected to fall into 
the dull routine of mere mechanical action. He is en- 
gaged in a contest where energy and skill will carry off 
the prizes, and where the unskilled and untrained work- 
man will pay for his deficiencies by a sacrifice of all 
those comforts and improvements which are the reward 
of intelligent labor. No artisan can acquire this improved 
understanding without a technical training which very 
few now possess. Practical life includes education, and 
the latter should respond with everything that life calls 
for. We want a training that will reach the great mass 
of workers. This is a matter of life and death. We 
don't want any more cheap workmen, for they are by far 
the most expensive in the end. Education must be based 
upon the physical laws of our organization as on our men- 
tal. Only half educate a man, and he is unbalanced. It 
is like setting a man to walk on one leg, or requiring a 
carpenter to work evenly without using the plumb-line, the 
water-level, or the square. Equilibrium is the foundation 
of what we technically term industrial education, which 
is exactly the counterpart of intellectual culture. It is 
the equitable adjustment of our various faculties, the one 



284 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

giving strength and skill, and the other wisdom, refine- 
ment, and ingenuity. It is a balance of ideas and dexter- 
ity, of ability to suit the action to the thought ; the alli- 
ance of mental and muscular devotion, in which industry 
shares in what has been the exclusive empire of literary 
instruction. 

It is evident that in this new order of teaching there 
should be due proportion of time allotted to each branch, 
in order to form a harmonious whole. The children must 
attend the industrial studies uninterruptedly, for they are 
progressive and in dependent connection. They can have 
no elective choice, as the basis of the system is to general- 
ize instruction so as to embrace mechanical tools and op- 
erations common to as many trades as possible, and chil- 
dren of twelve and fourteen are generally incapable of spe- 
cializing their own pursuits. The negligence of parents 
and the idleness of scholars are not to be encouraged, for 
the want of discipline in such a school would be fatal to 
the whole plan. 

Richard Grant White, whose peculiar views in regard 
to our public schools do not recommend his suggestions to 
the friends of education, has expressed, however, some 
views on this subject that are worthy of serious reflection. 
He says : 

There seems to be no other method conjecturable than 
the establishment of public workshops, which shall be 
public schools of the various trades or crafts, into which 
boys and girls might be received under conditions some- 
thing like apprenticeship. For, obviously, it would be im- 
possible to allow attendance at these trade-schools to de- 
pend on the caprice of the children or even of their par- 
ents. Without steadiness and continuity of attendance 
on the part of those who sought their benefit, these trade- 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 285 

schools would soon fall to pieces. This is one of many 
difficulties which would be found in the way of the estab- 
lisliment of such a sj^stem. Another would be the hostil- 
ity of the trades-unions. For, in the first place, such a 
system would multiply the number of skilled artisans ; 
and in the next the work of the public apprentices would, 
of course, be sold ; and for both these reasons all the 
trades-unions would make common cause against them. 
None the less, however, the question must be met and 
solved. The French, most logical, most practical, most 
thrifty of peoples, of all peoples the richest and apparently 
the happiest, have undertaken the solution of this ques- 
tion in ways to which I may refer hereafter. 

Public schools devoted to teaching special trades are 
not regarded with favor by those who appear to have given 
the greatest reflection to the subject, at least in the pres- 
ent situation of things ; but it is somewhat remarkable 
that the writer anticipates the hostility of the very class 
that is to be benefited by manual training in public work- 
shops. His expectations are quite likely mistaken, and 
perhaps the introduction of the manual element in a gen- 
eral way would obviate the objection. Those who can 
read and write might with equal consistency oppose giving 
instruction in those branches to all others, and demand 
that ignorance should not be educated, for fear that an 
insignificant fraction should lose the benefit which knowl- 
edge in these arts conferred upon them. The artisan 
fears competition, but surely he cannot object to have his 
own children instructed in the means of gaining a living 
by the work of their hands, instead of knowing no em- 
ployment, and thus draining European countries of skilled 
workmen to take the places they ought to fill for their 
own support. No class should take so much interest in 



286 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

technical or manual training as working-men, for their 
prosperity depends upon it, and in this period of high 
workmanship it is the only means which can enable the 
American artisan to hold his own in the fierce competi- 
tion to which all trades are subjected. 

It has been found that workmen are ready to avail 
themselves of any means of instruction connected with 
their particular handicraft. The report of the Spring Gar- 
den Institute is very significant on this point. Yery 
nearly one half of the entered pupils in the industrial 
classes are young men engaged during the day in mechan- 
ical employments, where they feel the need of such in- 
struction as the school affords. " They do not come for 
idle amusement but to work, and i\iQjpayfor the privi- 
lege out of their own pockets, demonstrating their good 
sense, and the failure of shop practice, as it exists to-day, 
to meet the needs of learners." The same effect has been 
observed in the English and Massachusetts night-classes. 
Take, for instance, the answer of a working-man to a series 
of questions propounded to working-men for an expres- 
sion of opinion upon the effect of education on the pro- 
ductiveness of labor in 1872, which reads as follows : " I 
knew three young men in this place, inside of the past 
four years, that took instruction in drawing machinery, 
while working at their trade^ and since then have taken 
out patents. One of them is now manufacturing an in- 
vention he patented, the American governor. I could enu- 
merate numerous instances of the same kind that have 
come under my observation since working at my trade." 

Another example occurs in the special report of the 
Bureau of Education, just issued (1883), where it is stated 
that a mechanic in New York city, who had accomplished 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 287 

SO much in his trade as to have received a medal at the 
Paris Exposition of 1878, in a recent letter to that office 
refers to the starting-point in his career as a thinking and 
educated workman as follows : 

After serving mj apprenticeship and working three 
years as a journeyman smith, I began to feel how igno- 
rant I was, and how much I stood in need of culture and 
other matters which could only be gained through an 
education. And, to lift myself out of this mediocre mine 
in which I had so long remained, I attended night-school 
twenty-eight nights at one of the public schools of this 
city, at which I mastered reading, writing, arithmetic, 
and book-keeping, single and double entry. Since that 
time I have been an ardent student. 

Besides furnishing a valuable and interesting account 
of various industrial institutions, the same report also 
gives the statistics of industrial work in evening-schools 
which have been established in a great many of our cit- 
ies. Many of the studies relate to industrial subjects 
though not to special trades, such as drawing, designing, 
modeling, and mathematics. These schools are usually 
attended by the children of working-people, and by young 
mechanics, in order to acquire that knowledge which they 
deem desirable and even necessary to enable them to pur- 
sue their various vocations with skill and intelligence, 
and which cannot be acquired in workshop practice. Al- 
most every industry is represented in these classes, not- 
withstanding the inconvenience of attending them after 
long hours and hard labor during the day. The report 
remarks that doubtless many have not strength to labor 
and study at the same time. Yet it may be assumed that 
the cases of injury from overstudy at night are fewer than 



288 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

the instances of moral and physical injury received in 
evening hours upon the street or in the haunts of vice. 
When at length a pupil is found who possesses strength 
and ability to combine faithful and efficient vrork during 
the day with intelligent study at night, he is worthy of 
higher education. He has passed a test that would have 
shown serious obstacles to progress in his trade, and en- 
ables his superiors to forecast the probabilities of his 
final success. He has acquired a practical knowledge of 
the matters which his technical studies would explain and 
illustrate, and thereby can pursue them to the best advan- 
tage. 

!Now I apprehend that men and children who sacrifice 
so much to enjoy the advantage of technical training 
which these schools place within their reach, will not ob- 
ject to a still more practical system of education, during 
the period of youth, for all. Employers ought to appre- 
ciate the important bearing of the subject, and encourage 
and support every measure for perfecting their workmen 
at home, instead of importing them from abroad. Ex- 
tensive business firms and corporations with every desire 
to discharge their obligations to their employes, and often 
with a careful regard for their comfort and well-being, 
seldom give themselves any trouble about their manual 
instruction. It is pleasant to find at least one employer 
who felt himself under the necessity of making the ut- 
most exertion and of using every means to instruct as 
well as employ them. I am glad to notice such a case. 
I refer to a gentleman who informed me that some thirty 
years ago he started a railroad-car manufactory of which 
he was the sole manager and mechanical head. The busi- 
ness embraced about a dozen of the leading trades. He 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 289 

began with the men he could find in the vicinity, only 
one of whom had any knowledge of car-building, and 
others had little mechanical skill of any kind. He se- 
lected fifteen of those who were best adapted to that 
end for a free night-school in technical knowledge. He 
taught them drawing and the principles of construction, 
and he soon found a great advance in their efficiency, and 
that it was the most fortunate plan he could have taken 
to put his efforts on the surest and quickest road to an 
intelligent and effective body of men. He educated them 
until they could advance by their own efforts. It stimu- 
lated hope and energy which carried some of them to 
high attainments, and their attachment to him was such 
that he always experienced the benefits of their constancy 
and skill. He still makes his workshops a practical school 
for boys, almost uniformly with success, and has qualified 
a large number for usefulness and prosperity. He is 
never troubled with strikes or trade combinations. 

If every manufacturer felt himself under the same 
necessity of giving some attention to the practical educa- 
tion of his men, success in business would be greatly in- 
creased, and the interested and active zeal of their intel- 
ligence would be productive of good w^ork and good feel- 
ing- 

The opportunities for industrial education will be 
many and varied when the leading business concerns will 
do something for the education of the young, in order to 
fit them for useful work and profitable labor. They now 
receive constant appeals from those having boys for em- 
ployment. Widowed mothers urge that their boys are 
greatly endangered for want of something to do, and very 
often that they stand in need of their assistance to eke 



290 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

out a subsistence. When public sentiment understands 
the importance of manual education, and that it can be 
successfnllj made an element in our public-school system, 
many of our large industrial establishments will provide 
practice-shops in connection with the public schools, where 
shelter, power, and machinery will be furnished at very 
small cost for practice-lessons, and the work of the schol- 
ars will compensate for rent and damaged materials, and 
the natural faculties so greatly varied in individuals would 
surely advance from the lowest to the fullest skill. 

The true object of industrial education is to make 
both art and science contribute their ideal influence to 
our useful pursuits. By this means the artisan is taught 
the mechanical application of the studies of the philoso- 
pher and the artist ; and so thought and industry form an 
alliance of mutual dependence and elevation. In his ad- 
dress to the Harvard students, Wendell Phillips referred 
to what he called a remarkable comment of Lord Brough- 
am on the life of Romilly, enlarging on the fact that the 
great reformer of the penal law found all the legislative 
and all the judicial power of England, its colleges and its 
bar, marshaled against him, and owed his success to mass- 
meetings and popular instinct. It would be an entire 
reversal of this passage if the industrial classes themselves 
were found retarding rather than promoting a reform in 
their own interests and honor. It would prove that con- 
servatism is not the exclusive privilege of any class. But, 
whoever opposes the movement, it will go forward. It 
concerns^ all classes of our people, for, as Professor Smith 
says, " unless the technical education of the producing 
classes in America is provided for better than it is now, 
that is, general education in tlie elements of art and science 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 291 

for every child, and in the practice of industrial skill for 
youth and workmen, all the great natural advantage of 
this country in extent and variety of native products will 
be neutralized and destroyed." 

The same author, referring in the same report to the 
indispensable necessity and great value of industrial train- 
ing in a general way, observes : 

I would impress upon you that this is a question of 
general and not of special education. The establishment 
of special industrial schools only, which, after all, is only 
patchwork veneering, and remedial, not organic and pre- 
ventive, will not meet the difficulty. That has been tried 
and failed, and will do so again. You did not dispel il- 
literacy and ignorance by educating one quarter of one 
per cent, of the population, but by teaching all ; and you 
will not, by any system of special industrial schools that a 
community will willingly support, be able to educate even 
so small a percentage of the whole people as that very 
insignificant fraction, nor* accomplish more for industrial 
skill by them than the education of a few monks in the 
middle ages did for the general education of the people, 
without common schools. Our general education must 
include the elements of art and science, taught to every 
child in every school during the whole period of school- 
life, and in reasonable proportion of time to that devoted to 
other profitable subjects, before special industrial schools 
are aught but playthings, which they have been and will 
continue to be whenever and wherever they have been 
established, without the preliminary preparation for them 
has been provided in the common schools. 

There is no country in the world to-day that can ab- 
solutely ignore public education in art and science with- 
out becoming impoverished. There is none, inhabited by 
white races, that has made so little provision for it as we 
have ; and, as a consequence, no other country imports so 
large a proportion of the products of skilled labor as 



292 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

America ; and that means a national leakage where there 
should be a spring of wealth ; raw materials exported, 
manufactured goods imported; pennies-worths sent away, 
to pay for dollars- worths brought here. It seems per- 
fectly unaccountable that, while the general education of 
the people has been so admirably provided for, even if 
too limited in scope, through being too exclusively literary 
and theoretical, and the technical education of the profes- 
sional classes developed in the most complete manner, 
yet, though apprenticeships to trades have gone out of 
fashion, the artisan and mechanic are left without tech- 
nical education, and, generally speaking, the American 
workman has to work by rule of thumb. Yet, so it is. 
I invite those who do not like this condition of things to 
remedy it. 

While you cannot find in any country a body of men 
with more average intelligence and brightness than Amer- 
ican mechanics, you can find none with so few opportuni- 
ties of improvement, in their several crafts, by education. 

As a consequence, our public taste and industrial skill 
are about in a similar position *as the same were in Eng- 
land in 1851. If we are to make a change as radical and 
complete as was made in that country, we must adopt 
similar means ; and if the political economists are wise in 
their generation, they will find that there is no time to be 
lost in providing technical education for working-men. 

Many other authorities might be cited to show the 
tendency of opinion. I give but one more. It is a pas- 
sage from the report of the Boston School Committee for 
1878, which I abstract from the same address : 

The question of teaching trades in our schools is one 
of vital importance. If New England would maintain her 
place as the great industrial center of the country, she 
must become to the United States what France is to the 
rest of Europe — the first in taste, the first in design, the 
first in skilled workmanship. She must accustom her 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 293 

children from early youth to the use of tools, and give 
them a thorough training in the mechanic arts. 

The llcole municipal cT Apprentis, already described, 
cost the city of Paris $150,000, and the working expenses 
amount to $12,000 a year. Each of the two hundred and 
twenty-one pupils passes through the school on the aver- 
age at a cost of $55.50 per annum. The return to Paris, 
for her investment in this and kindred institutions, is the 
art and taste displayed in her fabrics, which assure her 
wealth and magnificence. Her workmen can design a 
carpet, decorate a wall, paint a picture, carve a table, en- 
grave a jewel, embroider a screen, mold a vase, and add 
a grace and finish to every article of use or beauty, until 
she has become the acknowledged mistress of the world 
in the department of art-industry. 

In the condition of the United States a much less out- 
lay would be incurred for the public schools. They train 
the understanding until it becomes a reservoir of varied 
knowledge — the most complete system of mental devel- 
opment ever devised for popular instruction. Beyond 
doubt this can answer an admirable purpose, for it is an 
established principle with us that educated men and 
women excel those who are not so in whatever branch of 
work they engage. But what course are the graduates 
to take ? Has this superb education given them the in- 
formation they most need in this industrious world ? ]^ow 
comes the test. Here school -life ends; its motives, its 
preferences, and its work are now to be displayed in an 
entirely different order of things. Surely, one would 
think, after so many years of study, embracing the whole 
educational period of life to most of them, some of these 



294 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

acquirements can be embodied in works useful and skill- 
ful, and tbat it would subserve the general purpose of 
uniting one portion of the body with the whole in its 
use, and that it would extend its helping power to all the 
parts, and summon them into the harmony of co-operation 
in a life of self-help and self-reliance. Does not the re- 
sult of observation and experience warrant much of the 
sarcasm we hear, and draw from all the true friends of 
our school system an ardent desire for the introduction 
of such reforms and improvements as will infuse and im- 
press upon all the pupils the living practical knowledge 
of the useful and the true ? Professor Runkle, in noticing 
this deficiency, and in pointing out the proper remedy, 
remarks : " Suppose, now, that the same student had the 
opportunity during his school course, say till eighteen 
vears of age, to go through a well-arranged series of me- 
chanic art-shops under competent instructors ; what are 
the chances that upon graduation he would not enter 
upon that pursuit for which he felt himself best fitted, 
and which held out the best prospects, not only for the 
pressing present, but for the future ? That a coui'se of 
education forms habits as well as tastes, is obvious ; and 
it is unreasonable to expect that pupils educated almost 
exclusively through one S3t of closely allied subjects 
should show a partiality for pursuits with which these 
subjects have only the most remote, if any, connection." 
If these views of the distinguished professor be cor- 
rect, then there must be some defect in our system of 
instruction, and that defect must consist in limiting the 
studies to the intellect alone, and the exclusion of every 
element of practical or manual teaching. Perhaps this 
course, which is derived from the by-gone centuries, might 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 295 

still answer, were it not for the wonderful development 
of the useful arts, and the imperious needs which they 
impose for industrial and educational improvements. Me- 
chanic art is one of wider application to-day than any 
other branch of knowledge taught in school or college. 
To all men a knowledge of it is important, and to a vast 
number of pursuits it is indispensable ; nor does it impart 
useful knowledge only, but confers also a most valuable 
discipline upon the higher faculties, for one of its ends is 
intellectual. Let it stand, therefore, in its proper rank 
with other studies, and be rated just as it compares with 
them in elevating and instructing the mind, and imbuing 
it with that kind of knowledge which will increase its 
powers and promote the usefulness and happiness of man- 
kind. 



CHAPTER XY. 

Question of expense considered— Cost of workshop at Gloucester — At the 
Dwight School, Boston — ^Estimates of Mr. Chaney — Mr, Leland's school 
at Philadelphia — Of the Industrial School at Montclair, New Jersey — 
Estimates of Mr. Royce — Of the Spring Garden Institute — Helpless con- 
dition of the graduate, growing out of an exclusively intellectual train- 
ing — Natural substances are fitted by industry for use — Cost of support 
for public schools — Object of education — Manual skill and knowledge — 
High-schools — ^Professor Runkle's remarks upon high-schools — Manual 
training ; its advantages — Mechanical art — Multiplicity of talent — The 
benefit of generalizing illustrated by botany and chemistry — ^Applied 
to mechanic art — Drawing in all art — Generalizing tools — The use of 
machinery — Has not superseded the necessity for skilled workmen — 
Machinery has multiplied employments — Illustrations of the power- 
loom, printing-press, steam-engine, and cotton-gin — Efifects of machinery 
in reducing prices and increasing conveniences — The demand for per- 
fection of workmanship — Examples of well-paid skill — Inventions and 
industrial ambition — The forces of matter made useful — Machine-tools 
— Hand-skill still required — Building, carriage-making, etc. — The useful 
arts co-operative — The use of machinery not art — The trained artisan 
thinks while he works — Connection of science with useful art — The 
mechanic the true demonstrator — Science-schools in Great Britain — In 
the United States — In public schools — Education in the rudiments of 
science a necessity — Laboratories and workshops attached to high- 
schools — Not to teach a particular trade, but the underlying principles 
of all trades — Objection answered — System illustrated — Mr. Magnus — ■ 
City and Guilds of London Institute — Finsbury Technical College — The 
system adapted to our public schools. 

We have somewhat considered the question of addi- 
tional expense, and have contended that a course of indus- 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 297 

trial training might be devised wliich would make its way 
by degrees into various forms of work without much in- 
creasing the public burden. This has been the experi- 
ence in such schools as have tried the experiment of teach- 
ing some of the minor arts and the rudiments of mechan- 
ical industry. 

In the special report of L. H. Marvel, superintendent 
of the Gloucester public schools, in estimating the ex- 
pense of the industrial school there, he remarks that a 
room similar to the one at Gloucester can be fitted up for 
a carpentry-class at an expense of $500. In such a shop, 
thoroughly and completely equipped, one teacher can 
instruct four classes each day, and twenty classes each 
week, of sixteen members each, and the actual cost of 
instruction would not exceed $800 annually, allowing 
forty weeks for the year. The expense of stock would 
not exceed fifty cents for each pupil. Upon this basis 
the per capita expense of instructing three hundred and 
twenty pupils would be about three dollars a year. Prob- 
ably the expense would be greater, if forging and casting 
were added. 

The school committee of the city of Boston, in co-op- 
eration with the Industrial Scliool Association, have made 
a practical trial of a workshop in connection with a pub- 
lic school. One of the rooms of the Dwight School build- 
ing was fitted up for the purpose. A carpenter was em- 
ployed as teacher. The session continued from January 
to May, 1882. The total expenses incurred in equipping 
and continuing the school were $712. The principal of 
the school, in speaking of the great success of the enter- 
prise, concludes in these words : " I consider that the re- 
sults go far to prove that manual training is so great a 
14 



298 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

relief to the iteration of school-work that it is a positive 
benefit, rather than a detriment, to the course in the other 
studies." 

The Rev. George L. Chaney, the President of the In- 
dustrial Association in Boston, submits the following ob- 
servations in his report of a course of lessons in wood- 
carving, in regard to expenditure : 

A single ward-room like the one used by the school 
in Church Street, in any city, for the six months from 
December to May, during which time it usually lies idle, 
with very little expense beyond the original plant and a 
moderate salary to the teacher, would meet all the needs 
of three or four of the largest grammar-schools for boys. 

Three such supplementary schools, if used in turn, 
would amply satisfy all the rightful claims of industrial 
education of this kind upon the school system of such a 
city as Boston. At so small an outlay of attention and 
money might the native aptitude of American youth for 
manual skill be turned into useful channels. In so sim- 
ple a way might the needed check be given to that exclu- 
sive tendency toward clerical rather than industrial pur- 
suits, which the present school course undoubtedly pro- 
motes. 

The School Board of the city of Philadelphia appropri- 
ated the sum of $1,500 to defray the first year's expenses 
of the industrial classes in Mr. Leland's school ; and that 
of Montclair the sum of $1,000 for a teacher and shop- 
instruction which they associated with the public schools 
of that town. In his book on " Deterioration and Pace 
Education," Mr. Poyce estimates that at an expense of a 
sum no larger than $20,000 an industrial institution can be 
equipped for the instruction of seven hundred and sixty- 
eight pupils to be taken through a three years' course, 



MANUAL TRAINIXG IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 299 

besides evening-classes in wood-shops for — 1. Carpentry 
and joinery ; 2. Wood-turning ; 3. Pattern-making : in 
iron-shops, for — 1. Yise-work ; 2. Forging ; 3. Fonndrj- 
work ; 4. Machine-tool work. The annual expense for 
the industrial education of each student would not exceed 
ten dollars. He furthermore declares that a shop teach- 
ing carpentry and joinery may he furnished — to com- 
mence with — for $500 ; and that the industrial education 
of the entire youth of the United States need add no more 
than ten per cent, to the cost of our present school system ; 
but that the addition to the public wealth would make 
the investment the best the nation ever made. 

The Spring Garden Institute, already mentioned, com- 
pleted a machine-shop for instruction in every branch of 
mechanical work in metal and wood, except casting, and 
the general account of the treasurer for the year 1882 
sets forth the expense of fitting up the shop as follows : 

Mechanical Handiwork Schools. 

Salaries of teachers $366 00 

"Work-benches and other fixtures 82 15 

Gas engine 790 27 

Lathe 185 00 

Drill-press 125 00 

Planer 600 00 

Files, chisels, and other tools 532 70 

Forge, anvil, and tools 45 87 

Twenty-six vises 177 31 

$2,904 30 

It is anticipated that, as the pupils advance in work, 
more expensive materials may be required and an increase 
in the number of teachers ; but even with this inexpen- 
sive equipment the technical class is in full activity, and, 



300 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

as already stated, nearly one half of its one hundred and 
five pupils are mechanics who work all day and attend 
the evening classes to obtain instruction which mere shop 
practice where they are employed fails to afford them. 
There are unnumbered thousands in our cities and larger 
towns who would be signally benefited by an industrial 
training of a kind as simple as this institute can give, 
who are now utterly helpless and dependent upon any 
chance job they can get. They consider themselves above 
labor, because they have no ability to work ; but how far 
elevated above them is the artisan skilled in his profes- 
sion, and how superior in every respect is his condition 
to that of the despairing crowds who are clamoring for 
something or anything to do ! How many examples have 
we seen of young men veneered all over with the learn- 
ing of our schools and colleges during the twelve or four- 
teen years which they devoted to study, come out at last 
without strength or skill in any of the ordinary purposes 
of life ! Their education was addressed almost exclu- 
sively to the intellectual nature and its interests, and con- 
sequently they present the most pitiable form of help- 
lessness in all that relates to their bodily wants and neces- 
sities. Their powers have not been impartially educated. 
]N^ow, if man was of the spirit only, and if his employ- 
ments were those of the reason only, he could dispense 
with the things appertaining to this base and refractory 
world, and dematerialize his life to that higher form of 
existence. But, alas ! that is only one side of his nature. 
His wants and desires claim a most important influence 
not only upon his welfare, but also upon his mental and 
moral affections. The cosmos itself is his adversary. It 
is a globe of wood and stone and iron, of earth and air, 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 301 

of sound and color ; and we find tins truth, that in those 
periods when the ingenuity of our race was dead and dor- 
mant, the concrete forms of nature partook of the same 
immobility. To relieve them of their surplus fragments, 
to correct their restive or noxious qualities, and to adapt 
their excellences to the use of man, has been the task of 
his industry as well as the reward of his intelligence. 
The relation of education to the first as to the last will 
be better understood when we are willing to acknowledge 
that they jointly represent the physical organization of 
society and the refinement and elevation of human cult- 
ure. 

It is estimated that the school-buildings iu this coun- 
try have been erected at a cost of $175,000,000, and that 
they are supported at a cost of not less than $83,000,000 
per annum. Whether any of this immense expenditure 
can be utilized for giving industrial training is a problem 
that will be answered either way according to individual 
prepossessions. One thing, however, appears very certain, 
which is, that the existing school system has failed to pre- 
pare our children for the practical pursuits of life. The 
reply may be made that it has not undertaken to do so. 
But I should prefer to think that no one would urge that 
view, for it would be a cognovit of its decrepitude. 

It has passed into a truism that the main object of 
education is to prepare the pupils for the practical duties 
of life ; and as the common school is for the great mass 
of the people in order to benefit them, it ought to be di- 
rected to this end. "We cheerfully acknowledge the vast 
importance of mental training, but there are other ca- 
pacities that are essential to useful service, and whose cul- 
tivation is not less important to the individual or to the 



302 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

public gocd. Upon what principle, tlien, if any, can the 
function of public instruction be limited to the culti- 
vation of intelligence alone, and that no portion of the 
money raised by taxation upon all alike, should be spent in 
perfecting the manual skill and knowledge upon which 
the great mass of the children must depend in after-life ? 
The requisites of a true education should contribute to 
the development of both, and literary courses should cor- 
respond with industrial courses, and, after the elementary 
grades have been passed, there should be no question of 
precedence, or any objection on the ground of expense. 
It is as if a legacy were left to two brothers, and one 
should appropriate the whole to himself. Manual indus- 
try is winning its claim to a share in the present school 
funds, especially since useful instruction in aid of that 
object can be added, as we have seen, to the public schools 
without much expenditure, beyond the salaries of skilled 
workmen to teach, and in some cases additional buildings 
for shops and machinery. 

Perhaps no one ought to object to the creation of 
high-schools, although they are designed only for those 
who desire a superior degree of education ; but the time 
has come to require that they should have annexed work- 
shops for the introduction of the manual element as com- 
plementary to their theoretical studies. Professor Runkle 
remarks that if it is thought that a proper manual ele- 
ment should enter into the education of all, then the 
shops should be attached to the high-school, and serve to 
strengthen it by attracting students who now do not see 
any gain in the high-school course unless they have the 
college or some other particular end in view. " Admit- 
ting," he says, " that two three-hours' sessions per week 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 303 

for the four years would be as much time as would be 
needed for shop instruction, then a series of eight shops 
arranged to teach twenty-five in a section would accom- 
modate twelve hundred pupils. It is plain that only the 
laboratory method would made it possible to teach this 
large number of pupils, and one such series of shops would 
be ample for a good-sized city." 

From this rational and consistent view, it must be ad- 
mitted that the proposed system of teaching manual art 
is as general and elementary as any of the studies in the 
ordinary classes, but it has this great advantage over them 
all, namely, a liberal practice of the lessons in actual 
manipulation ; and all those who have derived their views 
from experience inform us that one who has had no op- 
portunity to observe this practice can form but little con- 
ception of its value in giving force and validity to the 
theoretical part of education, and to the peculiar aptitudes 
of the pupils. It is the method of teaching chemistry, 
astronomy, geology, navigation, mineralogy, and electrici- 
ty, transferred to the study of industrial art. The remark 
is subject to but little limitation, that the latter is a neces- 
sity to the great body of the children. 

'Now, it is not urged against the studies of the high- 
school, that they give a knowledge to the pupils which 
they would never use in after-life, or use only incident- 
ally, and that for this reason they should be excluded 
from the list of studies. Perhaps some of them might 
be discredited on this ground. But all knowledge is use- 
ful, and it will be a life-long benefit to any pupil if he 
can use the hammer, the chisel, and the saw, and under- 
stand the principles and movements of machinery. It 
will be of still greater service upon the character of those 



304 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

who arc tluis taught. Industry and application will be- 
come familiar to them, which will greatly lessen the dan- 
gers from idleness and dissipation, for it will be much 
easier to find an occupaticm when one has a general skill 
than when he has none ; he can also adopt the one which 
pleases him best, and which he can exercise to the great- 
est ])r()fit ; and, when lie is thrown out of work in one 
employment, he can turn his general skill and knowledge 
to account in another. The skilled workman can Und 
the means of earning a fair subsistence even in the hard- 
est times. 

Principles are few, but art is infinitely varied. Large 
masses of men till the different occuj^ations in our huge 
manufactories, embracing founders, smiths, machinists, 
carpenters, pattern-makers, upholsterers, painters, fitters, 
mechanical engineers, designers, and superintendents ; but 
whoever has been trained in mechanical art has the key 
to unlock the door to all these vocations. The natural 
faculties are as greatly varied in individuals as are the 
forms of art itself, and, wdien they are improved with 
rudimentary knowledge, they will enter freely upon their 
own development in an extensive class of hand-work, 
which is based upon analogous rules, and which require 
essentially the same kind of aptitudes. This multiplicity 
of talent extends throughout the domain of all art ; it is 
observable in the works of great artists. Albert Diirer 
was a painter and designer, lie had the glory, says a 
recent writer, of renewing the art of engraving and wood- 
carving, lie practiced the art of etching, and produced 
marvels of skill with a dry point ; and, like Leonardo da 
Vinci and Michael Angelo, he was an architect, a sculp- 
tor, a goldsmith, and an engineer ; he designed fountains 



MANUAL TRAINING IN PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 305 

with bas-reliefs, handles for swords and scabbards, and 
drawings for medals and coins. When the theory of art 
is understood, it only requires intelligence of mind and 
skillfulness of hand to fit any one for diversified useful- 
ness and a profitable employment of his labor. 

We have adverted to the power of generalizing the 
relation which is claimed for mechanic art, just as is the 
case in botany and chemistry. The immense number of 
species and variety in the realm of vegetable life would 
defy human ingenuity and industry, and the most pa- 
tient and stupendous researches into their nature, struct- 
ure, and growth would perish with the investigator who 
made them, were it not that whole classes of plants have 
characteristics upon which a theory can be fcjunded, so 
that everything that grows upon the earth or is warmed 
by the sun can be classified and indexed according to the 
general relations which science has explored and discov- 
ered. 

What Linnaeus accomplished for botany, another illus- 
trious Swede* did for chemistry. This science, found- 
ed on the somatology of natural substances, reveals the 
universal law of their relation. The chemist is able to 
represent the composition of numberless compounds by 
numerical formula3 which express truly and accurately to 
every other chemist the analysis and proportions of every 
combination of elements, and the reaction in which their 
relation exists. The extent and importance of the applied 
branches of this science to the useful arts may be judged 
of, when we reflect that there is scarcely a manufactory 
or workshop in which numerous chemical questions are 
not constantly springing up. In iron, pottery, and glass- 

*Jolian Jakob IJcrzeliua. 



306 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

T^orks ; in the reduction of ores, the assaying of metals, 
and the elimination of gold and silver ; in the arts of print- 
ing, enameling, gilding, bleaching, dyeing, photography, 
and electro-magnetism ; in the preparation of gas, electro- 
light, coal- oil, fertilizers, explosives, combustibles, mixed 
metals, and innumerable acids for practical application, 
the accumulations of chemical knowledge are so vast and 
varied that no single mind could grasp them without a 
theoretical arrangement by which the facts and principles 
could be generalized into systematic order. The " atomic 
theory," which gave rise to the numerical formulge of the 
proportional elements in compounds, is like a common 
tool by which the whole can be manipulated ; and the dis- 
coveries and experiences of one chemist can be understood 
and appropriated by every other chemist as soon as seen, 
and can be acted upon, with entire certainty of the same 
result. 

The same idea of plan and method is dawning upon 
mechanical art, and from the skilled mechanicians of our 
technological institutions we may hope to see this demon- 
strated by an induction of facts matured into a splendid 
proof that there is a scientific method in the implements 
with which industry accomplishes its miracles of skill and 
establishes the triumphs of art. Why, then, may not the 
theory of tools be understood by the children, like other 
elements of natural philosophy, for it is quite as easy to 
learn ? 

Of course, the matter of drawing is the great lever in 
all useful art. From horizontal, vertical, and curved lines 
in simple diagrams, the student proceeds step by step to 
the most complicated designs. The primary lessons are 
on a plane with his comprehension, but, as he advances 



THE USE OF MACHINERY. 307 

and combines, they lead him forward to a knowledge 
of principles of constructions progressively from simple 
forms to all the attainments his profession may require. 
So there are a few tools that, when mastered, give the 
key to a series of corresponding occupations. The square, 
saw, plane, chisel, and gouge can be applied to a wide ex- 
tent of industries, and an ordinarily ingenious person, 
who has mastered their use, can advance himself at will 
to the highest skill in a large catalogue of work. In iron, 
the tools are the square, chisel, hammer, file, chuck, and 
lathe. A mechanic skilled in the use of these, and with a 
thorough knowledge of drawing and design, can perform a 
great variety of employments, for he enters the vestibule 
of all the trades that labor in wood or iron, on brass, cop- 
per, stone, tin, ivory, gold, silver, or the precious gems. 
Such may be termed general workmen, and in accommo- 
dating themselves to some strange labor they may not at 
first be quite equal to its requirements, but they can very 
soon make full use of their general knowledge and skill 
by acquiring a slight practice of the new element to be 
mastered. With a knowledge of mechanical art, with skill 
in the handling of hand-tools, and the leading machine- 
tools in general use, they can do excellent work all along 
the industrial line, and can reach high attainments, for 
the stepping-stones of progress have been laid at their 
feet. 

We may be told that the use of machinery has so 
abridged the nse of the hand, that few things are now 
made in which it is at all employed. In heavy manual 
labor the intervention of machinery has been immensely 
extended. Think of the steam-hammer that forges an 
anchor, the hydraulic press that lifts a bridge, or the Cy- 



308 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

clopean furnace which welds a piece of iron that a hun- 
dred men would fail to move! Our dwellings, clothing, 
and food are prepared for us by the inventions of the 
age. These have introduced changes into the practice of 
every branch of industrial art ; but it is a great mistake 
to suppose that they have superseded the necessity for 
skilled workmen. They have served to cheapen produc- 
tion, and to multiply beyond all calculation the number 
of occupations in the department of industry. And it is 
now seen that, as our tastes are cultivated for higher de- 
velopment in artistic effect, our increased facihties in the 
use of labor-saving machinery are absolutely indispensa- 
ble to supply and gratify our wants. A complicated ma- 
chine, like the power-loom, produces fabrics woven by 
iron-fingered operatives, and the girl who watches the 
tissue and stops the automaton when it has completed the 
web will weave more cloth than fifty men with the Ori- 
ental hand-shuttle. It was thought that this invention 
would bring idleness and starvation to the hand-weavers, 
and no doubt it did produce temporary distress to many ; 
yet, how soon the increased production w^idened the field 
of demand, until it has become one of the most important 
branches of human industry and necessity ! 

Formerly books were copied by hand. The process 
was slow and costly, and those who could purchase them 
were circumscribed to a very limited circle. The great 
body of the people had no books, and even few of the 
rich could pay the price for transcribing them. But now 
the leaves are fabricated by one set of machinery, and 
covered with words by another, and there is no man so 
poor that he may not be the proprietor of volumes more 
beautiful and precious than those which adorned the 



THE USE OF MACHINERY. 309 

shelves of the great library at Alexandria. The com- 
merce of books which this invention has created is not 
only diffusing knowledge and forming public opinion, 
but it has doubled every other employment, both mental 
and material. It has originated callings and crafts which 
were unknown when information was confined to the 
few. Paper-makers, machine-makers, type-founders and 
type-setters, engineers, book-sellers, book-binders, proof- 
readers and compositors, librarians, editors, and authors 
have mostly been created by the fiat of the printing and 
paper machines. 

The steam-engine of Watt has probably increased a 
thousand-fold the industrial occupations of the world. It 
drives all the machines that work on wood, or iron, or 
stone, in cotton, wool, and silk, and achieves all the 
changes in their form which render them subservient to 
the wants of man. 

One can scarcely conceive of the vast revolutions, the 
extended manufactures, the multiplied mechanic arts and 
refinements brought about by "Whitney's cotton-gin. It 
would be impossible to enumerate the forms of labor it 
has originated in the textile industries of mankind. 

The manufacture of gas from pit-coal, which dates 
from the commencement of the century, undoubtedly dis- 
placed much labor engaged in candle-making, and also 
the employment of seamen and ships required for the 
whale-fisheries to furnish oil to be burned in lamps ; but, 
on the other hand, it has created an industry of incalcu- 
lable importance, besides contributing to a host of other 
arts, many of which are collateral to and dependent upon 
it for subsistence. Its splendor, however, is about to be 
obscured by the blazing effulgence of electric illumina- 



310 EDUCATION IN ITS KELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. : 

tion. Of all the elements, electricity is perhaps the most i 
incomprehensible, but of all it is the most obedient ; hu- ; 
man ingenuity will therefore be able to turn it to many '\ 
useful purposes ; and when art has overcome present dif- 
ficulties, and tempered its insufferable radiance to the \ 
softness of the sunlight, it will supersede all other modes I 
of lighting our streets, our houses, and places of public : 
resort. This may affect the dividends of stockholders, : 
but both rich and poor, the scholar and the artisan, will | 
participate in the benefits. j 
The grand effect of these and kindred improvements ' 
has been to introduce a marvelous economy of time and I 
labor, and a corresponding reduction in price, which j 
bring numberless conveniences and comforts within the I 
means of all classes. They were once, upon a time not j 
very remote, attainable only by the rich and noble, and j 
many of them the greatest kings would have envied. ' 
These appliances seem to have done more in proportion I 
for the humbler classes than for those of superior fortune \ 
or station. They make comfortable homes for the poor, ' 
and fill them with chairs, tables, knives, forks, and a j 
variety of furniture on which the toil-worn artisan can I 
rest or sleep ; they decorate his dwelling with wall-paper i 
and carpets, give him linen and blankets, and china and ' 
earthenware ; they furnish him with glass windows and j 
glassware and mirrors, and fill his kitchen, his pantry, ■ 
and closets with all the conveniences of modern im- j 
provement ; they enable him to sit in his own pew, and : 
to enjoy a seat at the concert or the lecture ; they make ; 
him familiar with broadcloth, and his wife with fabrics 
which, for elegance, were in her grandmother's day be- 
yond the reach of a duchess ; they afford him copies of i 



THE USE OF MACHINERY. 311 

the finest engravings and pictures, and a large share of 
the treasures of art and literature. 

But perhaps in no instance, so much as in the man- 
sion of the wealthy proprietor, do we witness such varied 
utilities assembled, or the skill of so many craftsmen 
harmoniously combined. It is an industrial exposition to 
which the most subtile designs of the architect, the skill 
of the painter, the beauty of ornament, and the swart 
arm of the artisan, have equally contributed. 

This universal demand for the conveniences of life 
could not be satisfied were it not for the machinery 
which has cheapened production so as to bring them 
into common use, and which has called into existence a 
multiplicity of useful arts in which science, genius, and 
industry find the most important and interesting avoca- 
tions. The changes introduced by machinery, so far from 
doing away with the need of cultivated talent, have in- 
creased the demand for it in every calling. Nothing can 
illustrate this more forcibly than the ever-increasing and 
overwhelming cry for perfection of workmanship in 
every department of skilled labor, and the increasing 
rate of compensation it receives. Professor Weir, in a 
recent address, remarked that beauty of design as well 
as perfection of workmanship is that which builds up 
such a business as that of the Tiffanys, who excel the 
world. In cabinet goods Americans also excel, but all 
designs are imported. Workmen educated in France 
and England command here large salaries. There are 
designers in upholstery in New York who receive a 
larger salary than the presidents of colleges, and more 
than a cabinet minister. There are designers on the 
Leslie pictorial magazines who are paid $150 a week, 



312 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

while those of the highest ability receive as much as 
$250 a week, to say nothing of what they earn outside. 

The inventions mentioned above are striking exam- 
ples of the instrumentality exercised by single contriv- 
ances over the destinies of the race ; but the constantly 
increasing importance of machinery in the advancement 
of mankind shows how much remains to be accom- 
plished by the ingenuity and skill of our artisans, and 
those who are to take their places hereafter. The bold- 
ness of industrial ambition, the various skill of the work- 
ers, and the vastness of the aggregate results, impress the 
mind with a sense of power that almost belongs to the 
sublime. It is to be remembered that these enormous 
mechanical giants have advanced to their present high 
organization by a gradual process of invention and adap- 
tation. It has taken ages of experience to reach them. 
The forces of matter are gradually yielding to the in- 
ductive powers of the mind, and scarcelj^ a year now 
passes that we do not convert their ductile agencies to 
our use. Every species of electricity is becoming sub- 
servient to our purposes, and galvanic heats are applied 
to numerous and important economies. Our investiga- 
tions have not yet taught us all the applications of these 
new powers, for they have not been studied to any ex- 
tent as they will be hereafter. 'Next to chemistry they 
are probably destined to hold a foremost place in the 
useful arts, and to make still greater additions to the in- 
dustrial employments of the world. 

Since the industrial revolution which resulted from 
the steam-engine, various contrivances have been con- 
structed, under the general name of machine-tools. Now, 
while these tools do both heavy and fine work, they can 



HAND-TOOLS AND HAND-SKILL. 313 

only be employed in large establishments, with an exten- 
sive plant and a great vanetj of machinery. The bulk 
of mechanical work for current wants in many parts of 
the country must of necessity be hand-work, as it is di- 
vided into so widely distributed details. Take as an illus- 
tration that of house-building. The material is all pre- 
pared by machinery, yet a large proportion, if not all the 
work of construction, is still by hand-skill, and of a far 
higher range of skill than is required for turning a ma- 
chine ; for, while the latter is routine work, the former 
is a continued presentation of new conditions requiring 
both judgment and skill. The building consists in sim- 
ply making into concrete form the conception already illus- 
trated by the drawing. It is one of the first necessities, 
and in its plainest form is very simple. The work be- 
gins in the forest. Trees are cut down almost entirely by 
hand-tools. The axe, in the hands of those skilled in its 
use, is a very effective instrument for many uses. It is a 
favorite with everybody, from the small boy with his 
diminutive hatchet ; and its need to a great variety of 
purposes in domestic life can not be denied. ISText comes 
the use of machinery for sawing the trees into various 
kinds of lumber, bringing it to straight or curved lines in 
rough forms. Another labor-saving machine of still more 
surprising power intervenes — the planing-mill dresses 
the lumber to a finer finish ; and by still other contriv- 
ances the boards, posts, beams, floors, windows, doors, and 
moldings, are sawed, tongued, and fitted to match each 
other. But, before these pieces become a part of the 
structure, they are subjected in a great number of details 
to the hand-plane, hand-saw, and other hand-tools, for the 
purpose of minuter divisions and proportions, as well as 



314 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

for finer finish, ornamental effect, and the best form of 
configuration. The heavy routine work is performed by 
steam, but the same skill in arranging the parts, the same 
dexterity in handling tools, and the same skill in finish- 
ing the job, are required ; for perfect work in architect- 
ure is a growing demand in all kinds of buildings. 

So every part of wood or iron in the construction of 
carriages and wagons can be obtained all ready made. In 
new structures this is a great convenience. But to make 
the carriage a complete thing, requires constructive sci- 
ence of the highest order — to say nothing of the painter, 
the upholsterer, and the worker in leather, who are asso- 
ciated in the finished production. Besides, carriages are 
constantly requiring repairs which it would be impossible 
to provide for, especially in the rural districts, in any other 
way than by making the individual part needed for the 
special want. All this requires first-class hand-skill. 

The same illustrations can be extended to all mechan- 
ical trades, for they are general in their application. The 
useful arts are pre-eminently co-operative. Thus, it is 
true that machinery enlarges the facilities of productive 
industry, and thereby increases the demand for a higher 
education in the theories and science of their movements, 
to make our greater facilities available. It is, after 
all, the hand-work of the artisan required in these opera- 
tions that gives a distinctive character to the work, and 
makes it a speaking memorial of his skill and genius. 
The use of machinery is not art. A machine copies, and 
can multiply a thousand or a million fold the same article, 
and it makes them exactly alike ; but the skill with which 
an artisan designs his work, or invents a remedy for an un- 
expected obstacle, exercises the spirit of true art, and de- 



SCIENCE AND USEFUL ART. 315 

serves the palm of refinement and originality. He evolves 
tlie present power to think and wort and the future 
strength and courage to create the circumstances neces- 
sary to his success. The moment he takes up his work is 
that in which his mind is busiest, for by a natural adjust- 
ment, all his abilities are concentrated upon the subject in 
a common focus ; and perhaps the thoughts which agitate 
his mind will find expression in the excellence of his w^ork, 
or in that which will add to its efficiency or improve its 
quality. 

Of course, I speak of one who understands the practi- 
cal bearing of the science upon which his work is based. 
There is a very general idea that the sciences have no con- 
nection with the useful arts of life, or that there is any 
need of cultivating them for the material uses of art. To 
educate a mechanic in science appears to many persons as 
absurd as it would be to give meat to a thirsty man, or 
drink to a hungry one. And yet it is of more impor- 
tance to teach him that species of knowledge than to do 
the same thing for the scholar. He is the true demon- 
strator, for he reduces the theories of the philosopher to 
practice, and connects them with substantial uses for the 
benefit of all. The mission of practical science is to min- 
ister to industrial art, and of both combined to reign over 
the broad interests of mankind and the work which occu- 
pies their life. 

The British Government, as we have seen, imme- 
diately after the first great International Exposition, or- 
ganized schools in all the commercial and industrial cen- 
ters throughout the kingdom for the education of working 
people in the various branches of science bearing upon 
their pursuits, with night-classes for those who could not 



316 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

attend during the day. In this, England but followed 
the course which had been adopted long before in nearly 
all the Continental countries ; and indeed in those days 
she had to import her chemists and other practical men 
of science from Germany and Switzerland. Within the 
last few years technological institutions have been in act- 
ive operation in the United States, and extensive accom- 
modation is now furnished in several of our colleges for 
instruction in all the applied sciences. But, as has been 
before remarked, these institutions are within the reach 
of only a few of the children in the public schools, and 
it is therefore a matter of sincere congratulation that ar- 
rangements, more or less liberal, are now made for teach- 
ing some of the broad truths of elementary science in 
the public schools, especially in the high-schools, many of 
which possess philosophical apparatus to illustrate the 
studies by experiments which lead to practical results. 
We have every facility in the United States for teaching 
the whole people the general truths of science. Unlike 
any other nation, which had to begin at the beginning 
by organizing a national system of education, ours is al- 
ready in existence, and the education of the body of the 
people in general knowledge has prepared them in the 
best manner for mastering a degree of accurate informa- 
tion in one or more of the sciences which bear upon 
their industry. There are but few pursuits above that 
of common labor which do not require for their suc- 
cessful prosecution information of this character; for 
science is now connected with all branches of productive 
industry. Chemistry is connected with many arts besides 
agriculture ; physics is connected with mechanical indus- 
try of every description, and mathematics is the basis of 



WORKSHOPS AND HIGH-SCHOOLS. 317 

innumerable arts indispensable to civilization. Education 
in the rudiments of science is a requirement and almost a 
necessity in present conditions. 'No great innovation is 
required. The study has already been ingrafted on the 
course, and all that is necessary to render this available 
for technical purposes is laboratory instruction in chem- 
istry, physics, and mechanic art. It is suggested that 
the laboratory should be attached to the high-school, and 
should consist of two branches — one for scientific appara- 
tus and experiment, and the other for machinery, tools, 
and workshop practice; and that in both the teaching 
should be by classes, and the students be required to per- 
form experiments when sufficiently advanced in labora- 
tory studies, and to learn their manual application in tlie 
workshop at stated periods, at least twice a week.* This 
is not in any sense a special course of study, but a general 
course in which the facts of science and art could be mas- 
tered in much less time and more pleasantly every way 
than are the abstract rules of rote-lessons whicli can be 
of little or no subsequent benefit ; and it is here that the 
approach between literary and manual instruction is re- 
vealed, and where they manifestly exert a mutual and 
co-operative influence. "We insist that all this is perfectly 
consistent with the idea of general training in the prin- 
ciples of knowledge, for it is designed only to teach what 
is of great value to all the pursuits of life, without teach- 
ing a particular trade to any one. And it is claimed that 
a general training in the laws of nature will not only 

* To obtain this very object, Mr. Seaver, Superintendent of Public 
Schools in Boston, proposes to establish a central Industrial High School, 
in which the pupils may be instructed in the use of tools preparatory for 
actual life. 



318 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

develop the intellectual faculties, but fit the student to 
master the special pursuit which he intends to follow. 

It maj be objected that the knowledge thus acquired 
would be superficial and of little or no use, and that no 
important results would be worked out by any one having 
only a little knowledge in a little corner of some science. 
Remember that this training, in a great majority of in- 
stances, will be followed up by a special application in 
some particular branch of industry. It is, therefore, only 
preparatory to practical work. Elementary acquirements 
are about all that education can bestow, and we know that 
they generally suffice for success. To disparage them as 
superficial is, therefore, to disparage all educational ac- 
quirements. There are a set of important facts which are 
attainable at school, and which will be serviceable all 
through life ; and they are about as far removed from 
profound erudition on the one hand as they are from sci- 
olism on the other. This species of knowledge ought to 
be included in what is taught by the school. In physics, 
for instance, how could the steam-engine be so well un- 
derstood as by its presence in the workshop, and the 
analysis of its parts and powers explained while in mo- 
tion ? How conld picture-making by the aid of a sun- 
beam be so easily learned as from the camera of an 
actual operator ; or the wonderful results of electricity, as 
when worked out by instruments intended for the illus- 
tration of these phenomena? It becomes evident by 
such examples that science is not the exclusive monopoly 
of the learned, but that it belongs to every man, woman, 
and child who passes through the public schools, and 
that it is as much a part of art and industry as of philos- 
ophy and physic. 



CITY AND GUILDS OF LONDON INSTITUTE. 319 

Mr. Philip Magnus, the very able Director and Secre- 
tary of the City and Guilds of London Institute, in his 
introductory address at the opening of the Finsbury 
Technical College, in discussing the relation of science to 
industry, said that the teaching in that school would be 
practical ; that more would be done in the laboratories 
and workshops than in the lecture-room, and that it might 
rather be said that the lectures would form a commentary 
on the practical work, than that the practical work would 
serve only to illustrate the lectures ; that the main pur- 
pose of the teaching in that institution would be to ex- 
plain to those preparing for industrial work, or already 
engaged in it, the principles of science that have a direct 
bearing upon their occupation, so that they might be en- 
abled to think back from the processes they see to the 
causes underlying them, and thus substitute scientific 
method for the mere rule of thumb. 

Having mentioned the City and Guilds of London In- 
stitute, I again advert to it as probably the most complete 
scheme of technical education that has been devised. It 
originated with the guilds or trades of the metropolis ; 
and their principal object is to promote the advancement 
of technical education in the United Kingdom by a system 
of laboratory and workshop instruction with explanatory 
lectures, both in the day-time and in the evening, for the 
benefit of those who are engaged or about to be engaged 
in industrial pursuits. The Finsbury Technical College 
is one of its adjuncts, and it establishes other branches or 
assists those already established in various parts of the 
country with both means and teachers ; and confers cer- 
tificates upon all persons who can successfully pass exami- 
nations, which it conducts in all the principal towns and 



320 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

cities where a sufficieut number of those who are compe- 
tent can be found. This work it has successfully prose- 
cuted for the last three years, and it promises more for 
the future to the industrial classes than any other system 
in England, not even excepting the noble institution at 
Kensington and its schools of art and science. The sys- 
tem coincides with the suggestions in this chapter, and 
fully vindicates the views just expressed. Our public 
schools would enable us to introduce technical training 
generally, and to make it omnipresent in the education- of 
all the children, and consequently of the whole people. 



CHAPTER XYI. 

Chemistry as an industrial science — Its necessity in the art of dyeing — 
Colors elaborated by chemists — Those derived from coal-tar — Its use 
in the fine arts and in other industries — Mathematics illustrated in the 
useful arts — Views of Herbert Spencer and Dr. Dick — Hydrostatics — 
Principles of the law of fluids and their application to industrial purposes 
— Electricity as a mechanical agent — Its subserviency to man's direc- 
tion — Its wide diffusion and power — Progress made, and the new arts 
to which it is applied — Geology and mineralogy — Geological deductions 
— Irregularities in formation and their study — Various facts of the sci- 
ence set forth, which have been applied to artificial uses — Mineral 
wealth of the United States — Methodical study in our schools — The 
division of labor — Applied in every branch of industry, especially where 
machinery is used — If one has been educated in the mechanic art, he is 
not likely to become a machine — Technic knowledge opens access to 
many occupations — The invention of labor- saving machines frequent in 
this country — Universal education, its advantages — American inventions 
— London " Times " on the exhibit at the Paris Exposition, 1878 — Those 
in general use — Causes of inventive activity — Classical learning, a di- 
gression — Amherst — The English language — Greek and Latin should 
not take all the time and space — True knowledge not to be sacrificed 
to verbalism — The ingenuity of the people is a national characteristic 
— Plan of education at Athens — Rome — In Germany — In France — Eng- 
land — Scotland — Lord Bacon and Locke — Bede and Alcuin — Mechani- 
cal training to develop our capacities — The effect of machinery upon 
the condition of the working-man — Various instances cited — Does it 
dispense with his vocation ? — Agricultural implements — The railroad — 
Iron ships — Improvements give more and finer work than they displace 
— Machinery depends upon scientific principles — A knowledge of these 
important to the artisan who fabricates them — The study of mechanic 
art indispensable — Industrial instruction — England and France — It is a 
public question — It is a mistake to wait for local industries to begin 
the educational work — Wealth, population, and intelligence. 

It was argued in the preceding chapter that there is 

no branch of industrial art which does not owe its im- 
15 



322 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

proved processes to an application of the laws of science. 
A knowledge of chemistry, for instance, is indispensable 
in many of the most laborious as well as in many of the 
most ingenious and refined of the arts. The w^onderful 
developments in the art of dyeing, ^vithin the last thirty 
years, have been in a great measure owing to the investi- 
gations of such chemists as Davy, Dupuy, Bergmann, and 
Berthold, into the principles of impressing permanent 
colors upon silk and cotton tissues. The colors they have 
elaborated of a vegetable and mineral origin are computed 
at over fifty in number, and those from coal-tar, which are 
entirely new, rival in brilliancy and beauty the tints of 
the rainbow. The mordants which fix the colors in the 
fiber are also entirely dependent on the close observance 
of chemical formulae. Chemistry is also of signal impor- 
tance to the fine arts, and to glass and paper makers. A 
knowledge of some of its details is constantly in practical 
use by the miner and the metallurgist, while in the new 
arts of photography, gilding metals, vulcanizing India- 
rubber, in making stearine candles, and extracting sugar 
from other materials, the influence of this science is never 
relaxed for a moment. 

Mathematical rules are universal in all forms of con- 
struction, and are constantly applied by the builder, the 
engineer, the mason, the brick-layer, the carpenter, the 
machinist, and the navigator. They are often laid down 
in mathematical tables which may be relied upon with 
safety in measuring the strength of materials, the trans- 
mission of mechanical power, and in many other particu- 
lars which illustrate their respective trades. But the 
engineer who lays down a meridian, or the sea-captain 
who reckons his latitude and longitude, or the architect 



APPLIED SCIENCE. 323 

who determines the structure of a bridge, or the mason 
who ascertains the strength of his materials by the tabu- 
lated formulge, works by rule of thumb, unless he can 
explain the elementary principles of geometry, or the 
scientific theories from which these rules are derived. 
He is like the boy who commits the abstract rules of 
grammar, without understanding their meaning. He is 
not a rule to himself, for he blindly follows the tables, 
and is incapable of any force when a case is presented 
which requires a critical opinion. Herbert Spencer dwells 
upon the importance of geometry in practical and tech- 
nical education, and he declares that in the higher forms 
of construction some acquaintance with it is indispensa- 
ble, and he proceeds to show by numerous examples how 
much it is involved in every pursuit and productive pro- 
cess. Dr. Dick also dwells on its utility and importance, 
and shows that upon the demonstrated properties of a tri- 
angle depend some of the greatest truths which we ac- 
cept without knowing the reasoning upon which they 
depend, or perceiving the important bearings which they 
exert upon our daily life. 

A thorough knowledge of the law of fluids is also 
serviceable for various reasons. Take, for example, the 
blunder of the ancient engineers, who acted upon the er- 
roneous notion about water not running up-hill. They 
erected magnificent arches and costly conduits across 
wide-spread valleys and over mountains, to convey water 
from a distance into the city of Rome. We can now 
water a city with cast-iron pipes, because we understand 
the law relating to the pressure of fluids, and can carry 
them along the most circuitous routes, upon the bottom 
of valleys however broad, and up the hill-sides again. 



324: EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

provided only that the destination of the stream, is not 
quite so high as the fountain-head from which it comes. 
This is on the same principle that artesian wells overflow 
the plain in proportion to the height of the distant mount- 
ains from which the water is conducted. This single 
principle is the basis of an infinite series of phenomena 
in the science of hydrostatics. From it is derived the 
rule that fluids press on every quarter laterally and verti- 
cally ; that they can rise no higher than the reservoir from 
which they are drawn ; that the liquid in a tube will coun- 
terbalance that in a cistern with which it is connected ; 
that when compressed it will rend and tear up with the 
force of gunpowder, and that when expanded into vapor 
it can drive an ocean steamer, or perforate the solid strata 
of the earth. These princij)les in the law of fluids are 
exceedingly valuable in their application to a large num- 
ber of industrial purposes, and their prodigious power is 
seen in dry and wet docks, hydraulic presses, water-mills, 
steam-engines, and fountains. Many other uses might be 
mentioned, for the engineer and machinist have exhaust- 
less treasures of energy in the simple and abundant ele- 
ment of water. Then consider the marvels of electricity. 
In the opinion of many learned persons, the mechanical 
agencies now in use are exceedingly inconvenient and 
cumbersome, requiring an enormous outlay and expense 
for the production of motive power alone. It is asserted 
that when our mechanicians become acquainted with the 
power, abundance, and availability of electricity for this 
purpose, these costly expedients will be superseded by 
infinitely better and cheaper ones. These important 
changes can only advance from a knowledge of scientific 
principles. We know even in its present state of imper- 



APPLIED SCIENCE. 325 

fection that, although electricity wantons under the form 
of the wildest contrasts — at one instant a destroying tem- 
pest and the next coursing the free air with the gentle ele- 
ments of life — yet it is the phenomenon of a constant law ; 
and that its subservience to man's direction is as unlimited 
as it is implicit. Since the discovery of magneto-elec- 
tricity by Oersted, and the experiments of Faraday and 
Henry, it can be generated by artificial means, and, like 
dynamite or gunpowder, packed up for transmission to 
any distance without diminishing any of its concentrated 
energies. The imagination revels in the wildest specu- 
lations as to the multitudinous uses to which it w^ill be 
applied. It is not only to aid all the arts, but to super- 
sede most of them by its innumerable utilities. There 
are those who even attribute to it the princijDal elements 
of animal life and the endless variety of form and beauty 
in the vegetable world, and who also claim that it pre- 
vails in a high degree in the senses by which we hear 
and see, and by which we taste and feel. But, however 
alluring the picture presented to us by the enthusiast, let 
it be borne in mind that progress can only be made from 
a knowledge of scientific principles, either in original dis- 
coveries, or in their application to practical purposes. In 
the mean time the progress made is verified in many ways. 
It encircles the earth's circumference with our messages, 
almost as soon as spoken ; it solves the most refractory 
substances like wax, and the hardest metals burn like 
paper in its incandescence ; it illuminates our streets and 
will soon do the same for our houses, with a light four- 
fold that of the sun's rays ; while telegraphs, telephones, 
photophones, photographs, microphones, and kindred con- 
trivances, show that this mysterious agent which transmits 



326 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

our messages can also assume many shapes and perform 
countless services to our race. 

And, again, the principles of geology and mineralogy 
must necessarily be understood by persons engaged in 
many pursuits ; for a knowledge of geological formations 
becomes important in discovering the mineral combina- 
tions with which they are usually associated. Especially 
is this knowledge exceedingly useful in ascertaining the 
location of mineral treasures, and where the ores and mar- 
bles range beneath the earth's surface. 

Geological investigations fully demonstrate that, away 
back in remote ages, volcanic forces were rending the 
solid strata of the earth, turning the inside out and 
the outside in, and preparing the way for the aggrega- 
tion, arrangement, and order of the mineral kingdom, 
and the evolution of the fluids required for the nourish- 
ment of plants, and the elements of electricity, nitro- 
gen, carbon, and other agents necessary to the composi- 
tion of the atmosphere, and for the maintenance of 
animated being. Homogeneous particles, widely sepa- 
rated, were brought into union, becoming artificers in the 
great laboratories of nature, assembling the waters in 
masses and the rocks into solid strata by affinity, generat- 
ing trees and flowers on the exterior, and preparing with- 
in the dark bosom of the earth the coal-measures, the 
vein for the silver, the matrix for the gold, the quartz 
for the crystal, the topas, the onyx, the sapphire, and fhe 
diamond ; the cavities for sulphur, for salt, soda, and 
quicksilver ; and the beds for iron, copper, tin, and plati- 
num. The minerals are not, however, diffused through- 
out the earth's strata with perfect uniformity, for in that 
case mineralogy would be an easy study. Every country 



APPLIED SCIENCE, 327 

and island on the face of the globe contains unmistakable 
evidence of volcanic action in the disposition of its min- 
eral veins and rocky beds, by which they have been thrown 
out of i^lace and mingled with sands, shells, and shifting 
soils. Hence the mineralogical combinations which so 
often baffle the ignorant and disappoint the hopeful. The 
study of these irregularities is very instructive, and it is 
no exaggeration to say that millions of dollars have been 
squandered in useless experiments for want of under- 
standing them. 

This knowledge has been applied widely to artificial 
uses, and will be still more widely utilized by the making 
of all natural substances serve us more and more. There 
is scarcely a mineral that can not be found in the United 
States. We have even statuary marble and unexpected 
veins of sulphur. We have inexhaustible wells of naph- 
tha, petroleum, silver-bearing veins, and an auriferous 
region of vast extent. We have mines of coal and iron, 
of lead and copper, which are found to be most abun- 
dant, besides many other sources of natural wealth that 
are being constantly developed from the cavities of the 
earth. It is needless to dwell upon the impetus which 
these developments have given to the industrial arts, and 
the wealth and power they have yielded to the coun- 
try. The immense value of knowledge in regard to 
mineralistic properties will be admitted by all, and is the 
strong reason why the methodical study of this science 
should be made in our schools. Our youth ought to be 
put in a fair way to educate themselves and to apply the 
laws of science in the pursuit of any vocation in which 
they might engage. And when we reflect upon the value 
of the mineral kingdom to man, and learn from history 



328 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

that the advance and retrogression of human opinions and 
enterprises can be measured by the refinement of the arts 
dependent upon it, we must certainly be constrained to 
accord to a study of its treasures the very highest rank in 
the sphere of industrial science. 

But without entering into the particulars of all the 
branches of industrial science, perhaps enough has been 
suggested to show how intimately they are connected 
with all useful pursuits. 

The course we propose seems entirely practicable, for 
the fundamental principles of the industrial sciences can 
be illustrated by experiments that will be exceedingly in- 
structive and interesting. There already exists in many 
of the high-schools a scientific course that can be easily 
extended as required. Let a workshop be constructed as 
already suggested with each high-school, consisting of one 
or more rooms, and equipped with lathes, vises, carpen- 
ters' benches, machines for testing the strength of ma- 
terials, a steam-engine and boiler, and apparatus for ex- 
periments on gases, fluids, etc. 

As regards instruction, there should be a professor of 
applied mechanics who should lecture on machines and 
mechanism, on materials used in structures, the steam- 
engine, electricity, the mechanical properties of gases, 
liquids, and mechanical drawing and geometry, and per- 
haps pneumatics and optics. Under the professor there 
ought to be a skilled workman to give workshop instruc- 
tion in the practical use of tools and machinery, and the 
conversion of materials into various forms of construc- 
tion. Perhaps the same object can be accomplished 
by transferring into the ordinary course some one or 
more of the excellent programmes that have been tried 



WORKSHOP INSTRUCTION. 329 

and tested in the industrial schools in this country or 
abroad. 

The course should comprehend two lessons per week 
for at least thirty-five weeks in the year for each class, 
and the classes might be so arranged that each in its turn 
would receive the same instruction. In order to have 
time for this purpose, if necessary, other studies might 
be diminished by requiring a less amount to be memo- 
rized, less reading, less geography, less grammar and de- 
fining. I have reason to believe that the sentiments of 
the best teachers are that too much time is allotted to 
these lessons. One or two lessons a week in applied 
science and the manipulations of industrial implements 
would relieve the excess of intellectual studies, and make 
them more interesting and easy, because they would be 
inculcated by examples which employ the senses as well 
as the mind. The pupils would see and do the things as 
well as memorize the formulge, and they would compre- 
hend them while being taught. If the phenomena of 
nature appear marvelous to children, the art by which 
man has illustrated them is still more interesting, and the 
inventions by which he has compelled them to do his 
work fills them with delight. 

The reform is easily practiced and immediately appli- 
cable. It comes in aid of general studies, and introduces 
into education both life and unity, for it will cultivate not 
one faculty or class of faculties exclusively, but all. 

In the possession of scholars exclusively the existence 
or influence of science is scarcely appreciable, but in the 
hands of the artisan it is applied to all the useful articles 
and purposes of life. Shall we teach our children only 
to open their eyes to wonder at such things, and then 



330 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

fold tlieir arms instead of learning to master and apply 
them ? 

The division of labor may be named as a settled con- 
dition of productive industry ; and it is assei-ted by many 
that it is to this influence we owe our superiority in many 
of the arts of life, if not our position in the scale of civ- 
ilization. This principle has been applied to almost every 
branch of industry ; and there are now few articles manu- 
factured by the aid of machinery that are not distributed 
to as many separate workmen as there are individual 
parts. This minute division of labor undoubtedly facili- 
tates production, and perhaps insures perfection of work- 
manship ; but, on the other hand, it is claimed that, as it 
confines a man to the same operation, he gets to perform it 
in a monotonous way, without exercising his understand- 
ing or inventive faculties, and that he is therefore likely 
to become almost as much of a machine as the automaton 
he guides. Man has been defined to be an animal who 
makes machines, but, if he has been educated to think, it 
is not at all necessary that by his work he should himself 
be changed into one. If he has been taught the compli- 
cated elements of mechanic art in theory and practice, 
and understands the principles which underlie the process 
of which he pei-forms but a small part, he will be restless 
to contrive expedients to better his condition or his work, 
and will at least be sure to experience the exhilaration 
which springs from the exercise of ingenuity and skill ; 
and in case a new invention should sweep away his frag- 
ment of a trade, instead of becoming an industrial out- 
cast, dependent upon chance jobs for a precarious living, 
he falls back upon his technic knowledge, which opens 
access to a multitude of occupations. 



OUR INVENTIVE GENIUS. 331 

Many labor-saving machines have thus been invented 
by ingenious workmen as a substitute for their hand-work. 
These instances are common among American mechan- 
ics. The general intelligence of our people, resulting from 
their universal education, infuses a corresponding habit of 
thonght in all human pursuits. We do not know from 
modern history of a development in discovery or inven- 
tion, extending from those that are useless to those that 
are admirable, that can be compared with what has hap- 
pened in the United States within the last thirty years. 
They would require many volumes to do anything like 
justice to those alone which have merits. The columns 
of newspapers are filled with advertisements of these me- 
chanical novelties, and our hardware-stores are magazines 
of them. Some of them appear almost imbued with in- 
telhgence. "We have, for instance, machines for paring 
apples and picking huckleberries ; for plucking feathers 
from live geese and taking pits out of cherries ; for put- 
ting up packages, soldering tin cans, and counting cash ; 
a flexible shaft for carrying power round corners ; and 
a shoe apparatus wdiich will convert a hide into shoes in 
about as short a time as a cobbler could pound a single 
piece of leather on his lap-stone. 

Remarking on this idiosyncrasy, the London " Times" 
wrote that " the IS'ew-Englander is an inventive animal. 
We are told that his brain has a bias that way. He is 
always restless to fix up something in a more convenient 
fashion than it has ever been fixed before. 'No matter 
what his training or what his calling, his mind is work- 
ing in a kind of back-yard over some idea for economiz- 
ing labor ; he mechanizes as an old Greek sculptured, as 
the Venetian painted, or the modern Italian sings ; a 



332 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

school has grown up whose dominant quality, curiously 
intense, wide-spread, and daring, is mechanical imagina- 
tion." 

Indeed, it is not, when fairly and discreetly examined, 
an arrogant claim to compare the practical inventions of 
our workshops with those of the whole world arrayed 
seriatim. This was seen in Machinery Hall at the Cen- 
tennial, and again at the Paris Exposition in 1878, where 
our mechanical display, though small in space, took all 
Europe by surprise, and gave the palm of originality in 
practical invention superlatively in our favor. 

In the leading and more important inventions, the 
instances of American genius are almost equally mani- 
fest. All parts of the civilized world use to a greater 
or less extent American inventions. The applications of 
steam to the propulsion of vessels, the perfect conduct- 
ibility of the electric fluid and its use for purposes of 
communication, the propeller, the turret gunship, the 
revolver and breech-loading ordnance that have changed 
the manoeuvres of war; chloroform and artificial limbs 
to assuage human suffering; the telephone and electric 
light ; an almost endless variety of agricultural imple- 
ments which have revolutionized the tillage of the soil ; 
gutta-percha and its marvelous applications ; the writing- 
machine and the pegging and sewing machines, are among 
the inventions which have sprung from the rich store- 
house of American ingenuity, and which have success- 
fully linked themselves with the industrial arts and em- 
ployments of the world. 

Our thorough system of general education may claim 
a large influence in creating this inventive activity, for 
intelligence makes men quick to see what is needed, and 



OUR INVENTIVE GENIUS. 333 

fertile in expedients to render their labor more easy and 
efficient. An ignorant man is not moved by STich mo- 
tives, and learns little from experience. General instruc- 
tion is therefore a great advantage, and when the stu- 
dents enter upon practical work — which, however, they 
now seldom do — it greatly stimulates all the faculties to 
save labor and expense. It ought, however, to be under- 
stood that to teach those branches which train the intel- 
lect alone is instruction, but in no true sense education. 
This theory does not account wholly for the inventive 
faculty. The high price of labor which seeks for less 
expensive methods, the protection of the patent-law, and 
the great pecuniary value of a successful invention, have 
been powerful motives to these triumphs of industrial 
art. But to all these must be added the innate resources 
of the American people, by means of which this country 
has so successfully assumed the place it holds in national 
existence. This gift can only be carried to its greatest 
usefulness by cultivating the faculties with which it is 
intimately associated. How shall we popularize labor, 
so that it shall attract intelligent men and so pave the 
way to improvements grander and cheaper than any that 
have yet appeared ? Manual knowledge in mechanic art 
is required by the masses, who have no fortune except 
their hands, and who can see no way of subsistence ex- 
cept by their eyes. What is to be done with tliis vast 
population ? To win them to the knowledge and attrac- 
tion of work is the great mission of the new education. 
Knowledge becomes attractive when related to our busi- 
ness. It is time to see this as one of the ends of educa- 
tion. What would we think of the husbandman who 
should cultivate the lilies of the field for their beauty 



334 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

and fragrance, and neglect all the homely but useful 
plants that produce wealth and support physical exist- 
ence ? And this is very like the vice of our school and 
college system. The common truths of science and art 
have been abducted by the professors of verbalism, and 
their living sympathies with our needs and necessities 
have been postponed for the business education of prac- 
tical life. I do not wish to speak in any narrow spirit 
of classical learning, but it is notorious that the critical 
study of the dead languages exists nowhere in this coun- 
try except for a very limited sphere of scholarship, and 
it is made optional after the first year in the courses of 
some of our oldest universities. Like everything else in 
nature, it has its time and place, but, instead of occupying 
nearly all the time and all the space, let it be curtailed to 
the limited necessities imposed by modern conditions, and 
placed in one of the back seats where it belongs. To 
teach in one of the technological institutions — like the 
one at Boston — requires vastly more learning and real 
attainments than to disseminate a knowledge of words 
and language ; and yet the great faculties of science and 
art, and their relations with industry and philosophy, hold 
an inferior rank in university honors. This aristocracy 
of talent has monopolized the good things in the garden 
of knowledge, and they confer the degrees of Bachelor 
and Master of Arts, totally unconscious, apparently, of the 
solecism they commit. 

The correlation of science with human sympathies has 
never been frankly recognized in our colleges, and it is 
not very surprising that it is dying out altogether at Am- 
herst. Its place and kingdom have been given to other 
studies, not from any want of attractiveness or vitality in 



CLASSICAL LEARNING. 335 

itself, but because it was dislionored in the temple where 
it should have been worsliiped. To inform us that the 
youth of Amherst do not take willingly to the study of 
the largest and noblest principles of human knowledge 
ought not very much to disappoint any one, since these 
truths are stamped by Alma Mater herself socially and 
intellectually with inferiority. To trace the nominatives 
of Greek verbs and the relatives of Latin antecedents in- 
volves a species of mental discipline, and the excellences 
of ancient literatures will probably always entitle them to 
a reasonable amount of attention. Our obligations to 
the Greek and Latin races are very numerous and very 
important. Let us acknowledge them with gratitude, but 
at the same time remember that we have a tongue of our 
own which, although it does not approach the classic lan- 
guage in perfect analysis, has yet equal power of express- 
ing the various forms of thought, and embalms a litera- 
ture of the most elevated sentiments, and conceptions of 
the boldest as well as the most harmonious periods, and 
of an eloquence vigorous and graceful, massive and reso- 
nant in its structures. Its accent is heard in every part 
of the habitable globe. Why overlook this branch of in- 
struction, and compel our youth to spend several years of 
their most valuable time in acquiring the essentials of 
what is termed a classical education? If it is thought 
best to continue the propagation of this learning, it 
should no longer rule as king in the domain of education ; 
but the children of science imbued with the greatest 
truths, and those of art with their splendid retinue of re- 
finement and utility, should take the time and honors to 
which they are entitled. All true intellectual culture 
must depend upon the drawing forth of the intuitive 



336 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

powers, or, in other words, the capability of generaliza- 
tion and deduction should not be sacrificed to verbalism, 
or the exercise of memory as distinguished from thought. 
There can be no rival to real knowledge for this work. 
To the accurate sciences as our guides and instruments 
we owe our power of solving the ordinary inquiries and 
necessities of life, as well as the sublimer problems of the 
universe, and an undoubted supremacy ought to be yield- 
ed to them for the enlargement of our views and judg- 
ments, and there should be no hesitation in assigning 
them the highest place in any scheme of liberal educa- 
tion. 

But to return from this slight digression to the subject 
of the mechanical genius as developed in the character of 
the American people. It must be evident that any gen- 
eral system of education for the masses, which fails to 
mold this singular ingenuity and address to certain ele- 
ments of knowledge so that they can act intelligently on 
all industrial objects, has either misunderstood its mission, 
or has been unable to comprehend the mental circum- 
stances which represent the characteristics of the national 
mind. Some predominating views or general plans have 
exercised a marked influence on the education of almost all 
nations, either ancient or modern, having reference to the 
peculiar bias of the population. For instance, the aim of 
education at Athens was to develop the genius of art and 
beauty of form. In Kome, it was directed to acquire- 
ments of general utility, and such as would render the 
Roman citizen prompt to serve his country. In modern 
Europe, the Germans originated the Reformation, invent- 
ed printing by movable types, and soon after produced 
many great artists whose works became monumental ; but 



NATIONAL SYSTEMS OF EDUCATION. 337 

they were mainly an industrious people working in home- 
ly diligence. In conformity with this trait, they estab- 
lished the '' people's schools " all over the land for general 
education adapted to the industrial classes. It was not 
until the middle of the present century that they began 
to develop those numerous and magnificent schools for 
instruction in almost every branch of art-workmanship. 

The French are gifted artistically, and consequently 
art-industrial schools were established at an early day to 
foster and develop this principle, which seemed to be 
original with them, and which has for centuries been the 
foundation of their prosperity. Eight centuries have 
passed since Charlemagne required every endowed mon- 
astery to support a school, and arrayed himself in gar- 
ments woven by the scholars of industrial schools which 
were attended by his own children. 

Although England is the cradle of constitutional free- 
dom, she does not seem to have had any plaa or scheme 
of education except in the richly endowed universities for 
the education of the nobility and gentry. The learning 
of Bede distinguished him in an age of darkness, and 
Alfred the Great was a student and writer whom tradi- 
tion has invested with every ideal of knowledge and vir- 
tue. It was the Anglo-Saxon monk, Alcuin, who became 
the preceptor of Charlemagne, and kindled the torch of 
learning at the court of that great monarch. The philos- 
ophy of Lord Bacon finally substituted real methods for 
the sophistical, and the rational for that of Aristotle and 
Pythagoras ; while soon afterward Locke vindicated the 
great principle that education should consist in teaching 
the truth of things and enriching the intuitive powers of 
the understanding and judgment. But it was not until 



338 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

the unfavorable exhibition of her art in industry at the 
Crystal Palace that education befitting the people actually 
commenced its brilliant and irrepressible career in that 
country, and she has since taken the lead of all other 
European countries except Germany for the general edu- 
cation of the common people, and the elevation and re- 
finement of those engaged in her vast industrial pursuits. 

The Scottish nation gave the first example of a free 
church and a public school. Recognizing the eminently 
practical qualities in the character of the people, the Scot- 
tish reformers established a school in every parish, and the 
system has been improved and extended by the care and 
wisdom of succeeding generations so as to make it com- 
mensurate with the wants and relations of merchants, 
bankers, artisans, and laborers. 

On the same principle, why should not our system of 
public instruction afford the best means, or at least the 
rudiments, of mechanical knowledge to meet our peculiar 
tendencies ? Practical lessons in wood and iron, in the 
use of tools and machines, would be beneficial as general 
information in this productive age, while they would cul- 
tivate the judgment and expand the mind, and they would 
also find their uses in many ways in practical mechanics. 
As preliminary studies they could be called into aid, 
whether the students became merchants, manufacturers, 
or artisans ; and would give proper direction to the in- 
ventive instincts of our people. New thoughts would 
arise from knowledge to make new things possible and 
profitable. Can it really be a serious question whether 
this is the only country in which the public school is in- 
competent to direct teaching in relation to the genius of 
the general mind and to the altered conditions of the age ? 



EFFECT OF MACHINERY. 339 

Unless education reaches this subject, unless there is 
the most practical teaching on this point, invention will 
proceed upon imperfect knowledge of fundamental prin- 
ciples, and time and money will be expended on imprac- 
ticable objects, and often with the most unfortunate re- 
sults. Fortunes have been literally sunk in the ground 
for the want of a little knowledge in geology or min- 
eralogy, and it is to the same lack of skill that most of 
the disastrous and fatal accidents connected with the use 
of machinery are to be attributed. 

Nearly everything is now made by machines, and this 
will continue more and still more to be the case to reach 
the minimum of human labor. The impression is still 
cherished by many that the effect of this upon the ma- 
terial well-being of the working-man is to displace his 
employment, and, by cheapening the cost of production, 
to diminish his wages. It is, however, the incompetent 
men that are discharged. Machines can not manufacture 
skill or art, and therefore, altliough the mechanical appli- 
ances are so numerous, the demand for skilled workmen 
in every branch of art-industry is so great that tens of 
thousands are every year imported from Europe. There 
are cheerful views to be derived from the history of the 
useful arts. Machinery not only relieves from hard toil, 
but it multiplies the number of occupations in a ratio far 
greater than the work it displaces. Every discovery in 
nature and every invention are followed by new arts re- 
quiring more refinement of mind resulting from a better 
form of industry. Once upon a time the soil was plowed 
by main strength, and wheat was trodden out by the feet 
of oxen or thrashed by the flail ; the flour in our bread 
was pulverized by a hammer, or ground in rude, inartifi- 



340 EDUCATION m ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

cial mills that bear little or no relation to our present 
methods. The grain is now removed in an instant from 
the place of its growth and dispatched to every part of our 
own country and to distant marts all over the world. This 
is the result of machinery, and the industries incident to the 
new mode of tillage are on a scale of unexampled magni- 
tude. Towns and cities have sprung up where but yester- 
day were the hunting-grounds of the wandering savage. 

Another familiar example is the railroad. Before the 
locomotive existed, stage-coaches and carts were about the 
only means of conveyance to all persons except those who 
owned their carriages, and few there were who traveled 
then ; and the only means of transportation were slow 
canal-boats and heavy teams of horses or oxen. Journeys 
were few and freight restricted. A grander way was re- 
quired, and man's inventive genius discovered it. He 
constructed bridges over angry floods, filled up wide- 
spread valleys, tunneled the mountains, graded the hills, 
laid down the iron track upon which he placed the iron 
horse and the resistless car ; and now he flies and turns 
and whirls, until the distant yonder becomes the here, 
and the here is everywhere. He also hitched the power 
of steam to ships of hammered iron, and makes his way 
through counter-currents, resistant waves, and adverse 
winds, to the most distant homes of men. There are 
numerous other inventions to w^hich the same remarks 
would apply, and the arts which they have added to in- 
dustry or the existing ones which they have indefinitely 
extended are so varied that they can scarcely be classified. 
They present a concentration of capital and labor, of ap- 
plied science and practical knowledge, which marks this 
era of industry. 



MACHINERY AND SCIENCE. 34:1 

Kow, all these inventions are based upon mathemati- 
cal, chemical, and mechanical theories. The locomotive, 
the steam-engine, the sewing-machine, the steam-plow, 
the reaper and thrashing implements, the railroad-car 
and the ocean-steamer, the power-loom and the telescope, 
all require a practical and technical knowledge of scien- 
tiiic principles in their construction. This is indispen- 
sable in order that they may be either safe or useful. A 
bridge remains firm only when it is built on sound cal- 
culations, and a machine is only useful when it is con- 
structed on correct mechanical rules. How important, 
then, that every builder, machinist, and engineer should 
understand the rules which furnish infallible methods for 
his work, and particularly is this knowledge essential to 
the artisan engaged in the fabrication of machinery ! A 
man may not be able to form a critical opinion upon a 
matter of abstract science, but surely a mechanic should 
know how the parts of a machine are to operate and how 
they will react on each other ; how its various movements 
are to be affected by the motive power, and what con- 
ditions are to be observed in order that good results may 
be obtained ; and also in order to prevent the loss of life 
and property, which is so often occasioned by blunders 
and ignorance. In the elementary principles of mechanic 
art wall be found a study of eminent utility to all the 
pursuits of life, but which will be especially serviceable 
to the inventor, the manufacturer, the artisan, and the 
operative. Mechanical learning is therefore making its 
way into the culture of the age, and there is a growing 
sentiment in favor of its teaching in our schools. 

" Industrial instruction," says a recent writer, " is de- 
manded by every principle upon which our general edu- 



342 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

cational system is based." "We must pay a fair price for 
it. We can not expect frugality, industry, and skill when 
we have taken no means to secure them. When England 
became conscious of her inferiority, she established her 
art and science schools, and has made such giant strides 
in art-production that the French have been obliged to 
redouble their efforts in order to retain their traditional 
superiority. We are in the condition England occupied 
thirty years ago. What shall America do? We have 
found that general literary education will not answer this 
need. Our schools are admirable, numerous, and expen- 
sive, and yet we stand at the bottom of all civilized na- 
tions in everything relating to industrial education. This 
is a question that concerns us all — the buyer, the seller, 
the worker, the poor, and the rich. It is a public ques- 
tion, for our arts are passing into the hands of aliens, and 
our markets into the control of foreigners. 

A writer in " The Popular Science Monthly " maga- 
zine argues that no central organization or institution can 
be expected to do the work which, at the outset, the local 
industries must initiate for themselves, and develop by 
their own resources. 'Not so thought England, when she 
organized her great industrial museum and art-schools to 
encourage and improve her manufactures, before " local 
industries " had laid the foundation of a single institution 
in the kingdom. Not so thought Germany, w^hich has 
evolved some of the most important additions to human 
knowledge and advancement within the last three hun- 
dred years, when she seized this problem in her robust in- 
telligence, and solved it for her own people by establish- 
ing an industrial school by law. The "New England 
Puritan planted the common school in the wilderness, and 



WEALTH, POPULATION, INTELLIGENCE. 343 

the Western pioneer builds the school-honse and the log- 
cabin simultaneously. It is the need of these things that 
induces public action before the young can grow up in 
ignorance and idleness ; and it would indeed be a mistake 
to wait until they had been locally developed, and the 
statistics of their success had excited popular favor. 
There is an opportunity for endowing a school of this 
character in every town and city ; but do the local indus- 
tries turn their attention to the necessities or tendencies 
of our times ? And in view of the notorious incompe- 
tency and indisposition of these bodies to elaborate plans 
of education to supply the need, we can scarcely look to 
them for the proper remedy. 

Now, since the great mass of the children in the pub- 
lic schools will have to depend upon some kind of em- 
ployment for a living, is there anything unreasonable in 
affording them an opportunity to acquire that kind of 
knowledge which will open up to them every form of 
skilled workmanship, which will emancipate them from 
the narrowness of a single trade, and make them useful 
and prosperous citizens ? 

In a commercial and artistic point of view, the advan- 
tages of mechanical skill and its combination with beauty 
appear to be unlimited, for beauty and skill are sold in 
the market, and delivered to the highest bidder. The 
people who produce the fleetest ships, the finest fabrics, 
the most effective arms, and who possess an economical 
and richly productive agriculture, and a varied and edu- 
cated mode of manufacture and general industry, will 
always have greater wealth, population, and intelligence 
than it is possible to attain without them. 



CHAPTER XYII. 

Moral influence of industry — West Philadelphia Penitentiary — Criminal sta- 
tistics — Xecessity of manual training to correct degrading views of 
labor — Also as preparatory for the safety of society — Advantages of 
industrial education to workmen — It improves their condition and cul- 
tivates the moral affections — Early impressions — Mr. Richards's views 
— Exclusive intellectual training creates a disdain for labor — The con- 
nection between idleness and vice — ^Public schools progressive — The 
friends of industrial education should vindicate the public schools for 
their reconstructing tendency — Mr. Eraser's report to the British Gov- 
ernment — The improvement of public schools since that time — The 
education of Indians — Hampton Institute — It is an industrial school — 
Indians taught trades — The best way to educate and civilize them — 
Manual training as an antidote to over-study — Dr. Richardson's views 
— Boston committee on the subject— The Industrial Home School at 
Washington — The effect of skill in workmanship upon the condition of 
the workers — Science and art mutually aid each other — The laboring 
artist reappears — The establishment of Messrs. Minton — " L'Art Re- 
vue " — Fine art in the United States — Production in art-industry — Its 
humanizing influence — Art and science — Mental industry and material 
industry in close alliance — The worker is rising higher and higher, and 
is gaining in intellectual enjoyment — ^Industrial education the work- 
ing-man's best friend. 

It may also increase our interest in the economic as- 
pect of our subject if we reflect that intelligent labor is 
the cheapest police of society, and the main-stay in the 
moralities of law and order ; that it not only secures the 
means of subsistence, but effectually takes away the in- 
ducements to idleness and vice. It is an old proverb that 



IDLENESS AND CRIME. 345 

idleness leads to poverty, and often to crime. A good 
journeyman is usually a good citizen. We seldom, if 
ever, hear of a skilled machinist in the penitentiary. 
Recorder Yaux gives some interesting figures concerning 
the penitentiary at West Philadelphia. They cover two 
decades, from 1860 to 1880. In the first, there were 
1,605 prisoners received. Of these, 1,115 could both read 
and write, but 1,217 had never been apprenticed to a 
trade. In the second decade, there were 2,383 prisoners 
received. Of these, 1,677 could read and write, but 1,950 
had never been apprenticed. 

Mr. George S. Angell, who abounds in all kinds of 
good works, informs me that out of 1,368 prisoners in the 
Auburn State Prison, E'ew York, a short time since, 1,182 
had a greater or less education in colleges, academies, 
public schools, and elsewhere. As showing the increase 
in crime, he states that even in Massachusetts it doubled 
in one decade. In 1865 there were about 10,000 persons 
confined in the various prisons of the State, and during 
the year 1875 there were 20,000 ; and that about twice as 
many arrests are made annually in the city of 'New York 
as were made in all Massachusetts during the year 1880 
— namely, 71,477. He also shows that the destruction of 
property by fire increased in ten years from $35,000,000 
in 1868 to about $100,000,000 in 1878 ; that there are 
large organized societies of criminals throughout the 
country; that the largest proportion of the criminal 
classes are young men not over the age of twenty-fivo 
years ; that generally they can read and write ; and that 
in no country are life and property more insecure than 
in portions of the United States. Among the principal 
remedies he suggests are industrial schools and the plant- 



346 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

ing of colonies on the unoccupied lands of the Govern- \ 
ment, in order to give occupation to the unemployed. i 

From this it would appear that a mere deficiency of | 
ordinary education has less to do with the existence and j 
appalling increase of crime than idleness and the lack of i 
knowing how to work.* These criminals had been taught | 
no useful art, and their intellectual training had little or : 
no influence in counteracting their criminal propensities. ; 
The tramp is a recent phase of debasement. The crowd- ' 
ed tenement-houses in our large cities swell immensely i 
the statistics of brutality and dishonor, and I fancy that i 
an artisan with competent knowledge of his profession , 
never gravitates to these dens of wretchedness and \ 
squalor. \ 

In referring to criminal statistics, a recent writer has | 
remarked that 

The cost of the depredations of property, the detec- ; 
tion and detention of criminals, their trials, the cost of \ 
their support in prisons throughout the United States, 
and all the paraphernalia of criminal jurisprudence, might . 
be set down, at the least calculation, at $500,000,000. \ 
Put this sum of money in industrial schools throughout ; 
the country, and it will give fifty dollars a head for every ■ 
child in the land. This would be a cheap investment j 
compared to the expense of detecting, adjudging, and j 
maintaining criminals ; for this is * a stone that can never ■ 

* If I am correctly informed, there are only four persons out of every \ 

hundred in Pennsylvania that cannot read or write ; it follows that this four \ 

per cent furnished in the first decade nearly one third of the criminals in the i 

Philadelphia penitentiary. It is also stated that less than twenty per cent ': 

of the total population of Pennsylvania are apprenticed ; it follows that the • 

criminals were furnished in about equal proportions from those apprenticed i 

and those unapprenticed. In the absence of official documents, I rely for j 

these statistics upon one in a position to know. j 



MORAL INFLUENCE OF INDUSTRY. 34,7 

be rolled to the top of the hill,' but ever rolls back again ; 
while industrial education would give us, out of one 
generation of children, a cheerful, orderly, serviceable 
people, self-respecting, and respectful of law. 

The remedy here suggested for the evils complained 
of I unhesitatingly assume is the substantial one — viz., to 
train those who are to become citizens in the fundamental 
rudiments of the arts of necessity, to teach them to do 
something. If this is not done, the things that have 
happened will be repeated indefinitely, and the children 
will be delivered up to the thought that there is no work 
in which they can engage, and no way possible in which 
they can acquire a knowledge of work without great waste 
of time and drudgery ; and they will thus inevitably ac- 
quire a disposition to get along as best they can without 
it ; and to yield to the example of so many others in a 
sort of disdain for those who labor, until they confound 
all obligations to be useful into a skepticism of their abil- 
ity to earn an honest living, and that, as the public have 
educated them into this belief, it ought to support them. 
Who can doubt the salutary influence of practical teach- 
ing upon the great evils of society — ^idleness, and the con- 
sequences which flow from it ? The pupils would find as 
much interest as profit in manual lessons — lessons at once 
scientific and useful — in harmony with modern demands, 
and preparing the future citizen, the future artisan, and 
the men of action who are to carry on the great industries 
of society, in which the laws of God are to be respected, 
justice upheld, intellect cultivated, taste diffused, and 
human existence embeUished by industry, morality, and 
genius. In the relations of life there is a moral obliga- 
tion to know something practical in order to live, and a 



348 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

knowledge of exterior things is necessary to guide us 
surely in regard to what is either useful or good. 

In former parts of this work I have thrown out many 
remarks to show that the industrial schools in Europe 
had provided the pupils with knowledge which enabled 
them greatly to improve their condition, and that it 
affected favorably, not only their habits, but their moral- 
ity, giving them a taste for study, and ideas of order and 
providence which contributed powerfully to their well- 
being and that of their families ; that the advantages con- 
ferred upon workmen by these institutions were cor- 
roborated by the strongest proofs, some of which were 
stated and need not be repeated, and, among other bene- 
fits, that they were better fed, better clothed, better 
housed, and better behaved ; and their condition morally 
and socially improved in a very remarkable degree ; and 
that vagrancy, drunkenness, and crime had almost eutirely 
disappeared where industrial education had been con- 
ducted with judgment and success. 

The influence of art-industry is not only that it mul- 
tipKes objects of value, not only that it creates and beau- 
tifies those which are prized by the affluent as well as 
those which are necessary for the poor, but it strengthens 
all those important influences upon which our moral affec- 
tions depend for their support and permanence. Human 
virtue results greatly from our surroundings. Give the 
people lucrative employment, and you will do as much 
for their morals as for their comfort. Skilled labor com- 
mands the highest wages. A man must have a pleasant 
home, clothing suitable for his family, the means of edu- 
cating his children, and a proper reception in the circle 
of society to which he belongs. ISTow, the same industry, 



MORAL INFLUENCE OF INDUSTRY. 34-9 

mechanical skill, and ingenuity combined in the produc- 
tions of useful art will also procure these different but 
equally indispensable ends to human happiness and moral 
excellence. The skilled artisan, by the exercise of his 
profession, becomes refined in his tastes, and he provides 
his family with innumerable comforts, which — 

With sweet succession taiiglit e'en toil to please. 

If industrial training alternated with mental exercises, 
it is not unreasonable to conclude that the habit of indus- 
try would make a lasting impression upon the pupils, and 
that upon leaving school many would enter upon some 
useful pursuit according to the bent and aptitude which 
had been developed by their studies. We all know the 
strength of early impressions, and that they often exer- 
cise a controlling influence over a lifetime. Says Mr. 
Zalmon Richards, in his premium essay upon the true 
order of studies : !' Children should be so trained in their 
early education that they may constantly feel that all 
their intellectual attainments are valuable only as they 
use them in the legitimate employments and duties of 
life. Right here we find some of the gravest defects in 
our systems or methods of training. Thousands of our 
youth come from their schools of every grade with aim- 
less purposes, and many of them spend aimless lives, or 
else, perhaps, they think their intellectual training entitles 
them to a living anyway without hard work. The indus- 
trial training needed, and herein advocated, is not a spe- 
cial training for a trade, nor the learning of a trade, but 
such as will fit all children for any trade or occupation, 
and show their capacities and aptitudes for any desirable 
employment, so that they will not be liable to make a 



350 EDUCATION IX ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

mistake in choosing an employment for life, as thousands 
do." 

The views of this accomplished and practical educator 
are in perfect accord with universal experience, for it is 
a fact that the bias which the young receive during the 
period of school-life will generally remain to influence 
their conduct afterward : their ignorance of the principles 
and practice of industrial art, and the unfavorable opin- 
ion which their exclusively intellectual training has given 
them of handiwork, are so inveterate that but compara- 
tively few of them enter upon industrial careers ; while 
many of them actually imbibe a feeling of disdain for 
useful employment. If industry were taught and exem- 
plified in practice for several years when the mind is 
susceptible to every influence, and when the habits can 
be molded into harmonious relations with necessity, it 
would be of immense importance in the individual life 
and moral character of every being. The intellect is the 
reasoning faculty of human life ; but the passions are 
greater in intensity, and work in restless agitation to con- 
trol the whole character and conduct of the man. Idle- 
ness is the well-spring of their power, but industry is one 
of the limitations to this influence, and a powerful check to 
chastise and endow it with moderation. It would at least 
curb those degrading views of labor which drive such 
multitudes of the young into the genteel professions from 
a feeling of petty pride. 

The connection between idleness and vice is so con- 
stant, that statisticians assume it to be phenomenal, and 
their statements, supported by figures, exhibit a frightful 
view of its extent and progress. The evils of intemper- 
ance, of crime, and of poverty generally, originate with 



THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS PROGRESSIVE. 351 

those wlio, for want of manual instruction, are unwilling 
or unable to earn their living by honest industry. And 
it is to be feared that, unless a general system of indus- 
trial training can be extended to all classes, good, bad, 
and degraded, the best efforts at reformation by individ- 
uals will be altogether insufficient to counteract the im- 
moralities engendered by this evil. 

These views are not expressed for the purpose of 
showing that the education provided by the public schools 
leads to pauperism and crime, as some lugubrious critics 
have recently discovered. The latest observations of this 
kind have been directed against the J^orthern States, es- 
pecially ]^ew England, where the native-born population 
are nearly all educated, and mostly at the public schools, 
and among whom I will assume to say there is more gen- 
eral intelligence and less crime than among the same 
number of people elsewhere on the face of the globe. 
The friends of industrial education should have no sym- 
pathy with the sneers leveled so often at the public school, 
for it is the most progressive of all our institutions, not- 
withstanding the opposition of the prejudiced upholders 
of antiquated methods, and of those who antagonize inno- 
vations generally, and particularly the introduction of 
manual training into the sphere of instruction. 

As far back as 1865 the Eev. James Fraser was dis- 
patched from England to the United States for the pur- 
pose of reporting to the British Government upon the 
subject of our common-school system. After stating that 
the benefits derived from the schools are not so great as 
is believed in Europe, he adds the following tribute to 
the general result: "Notwithstanding these hindrances, 
and if not accomplishing all of which it is theoretically 



352 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

capable; if lacking some elements which we deem pri- 
mary, and of which Americans themselves feel and regret 
the loss, the common-school system is still contributing 
powerfully to the development of a nation of which it 
is no flattery or exaggeration to say that it is, if not the 
most highly educated, yet certainly the most generally 
educated and intelligent people on the earth." 

Since that time the schools have been almost recon- 
structed without endangering the essential principle of 
free education. The lacking elements which "Ameri- 
cans themselves regret " have been largely supplied. J^or- 
mal schools have been instituted, training teachers in the 
most perfect modes of teaching ; the teachers are better 
qualified and paid, and their social position has become 
almost equal to a professional one ; and men and women 
of superior attainments are devoting themselves to the 
new profession. The schools have been graded, the 
studies enlarged, the art of drawing generally taught, 
school-books improved, and the system of teaching by 
rote has fallen into desuetude. The dissatisfaction aris- 
ing from religious feelings, and the unfriendly strictures 
of occasional writers, have ceased materially to affect the 
current of public opinion, unless it be to make the sys- 
tem more perfect, and to open its unrivaled opportuni- 
ties to the untaught of every class and of every denomi- 
nation. 

It is this reconstructing tendency that is the best hope 
of the system. Efforts have already commenced, not un- 
successfully, to introduce a limited amount of scientific 
teaching, and some knowledge of manipulation with tools, 
and even machines in more than one instance are called 
in as aids to education. In due course of time some- 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION OF INDIANS. 353 

thing more will be attempted, and the outlines of indus- 
trial science will assume a tangible and permanent place 
alongside of the fundamental learning in reading, writ- 
ing, and arithmetic. 

I have referred more than once to the deterioration 
of a people who lose or forget their habits of industry. 
Of this there are many historical examples. Rome re- 
mained mistress of the world until her arts passed into 
the hands of strangers and slaves. We have another ex- 
ample nearer home, for an unknown race of great intelli- 
gence formerly occupied this continent, as is evident from 
fragments of their arts found throughout the vast regions 
extending from the Ohio to the Gulf of Mexico. Rings, 
chisels, knives, and hammers — pottery, vases, and huge 
earthworks — show that they were miners, manufacturers, 
and mound-builders. Nothing remains of them but the 
work of their hands. Their very name is forgotten. 
Let us hope, however, that a new era has dawned for 
their barbarous descendants, since an opportunity is now 
offered the red-man to regain the arts of his unknown 
progenitors. The educational regeneration of the Indians 
has commenced at the Hampton Institute in Virginia, and 
in the Grovernment school at Carlisle, Pennsylvania — the 
object being to reclaim them from savagery, and to make 
them students, mechanics, and farmers. At the former 
of these schools Indian boys and girls are sent by the 
Government, which pays their fare to and from the insti- 
tute, and $150 per annum for each pupil. The balance 
of the expenses for tuition, board, washing, fuel, lights, 
and medical attendance for sixty-five Indians, during the 
year 1881, was $4,550. The institute, which is a private 
corporation, looks to individuals and the public to supply 



334 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

this deficiency. General Armstrong, the founder of the 
institution, remarks, in his annual report, that a small 
portion of the money spent during the last five years 
fighting the Indians would educate them all. What is 
most admirable in the scheme is that, in addition to ele- 
mentary teaching, industrial education is accorded an 
essential place. All must work, and the Indian youths 
are taught in trades of shoemaking, blacksmithing, tin- 
smithing, and as carpenters, wheelwrights, and farmers. 
The girls are quite proficient in acquiring the household 
arts, and are said to excel in the performance of work for 
personal decoration, which is but a development of the 
skill in savage life. As a proof of their aptitude for 
mechanics, it may be mentioned that ail of the tin and 
sheet-iron utensils used in the school-kitchens are made 
by two Sioux from the Cheyenne River and Lower Brule 
agencies, who have become expert tinsmiths in the three 
years (1882) of their being in the school ; and they intend 
to form a partnership and conduct that business on their 
reservation. The correspondent in the JS'ew York Her- 
ald, from whom I gather these facts, has a paragraph in 
which he states as follows : 

I spent the forenoon yesterday in the industrial de- 
partment of the institution. I found Peters working at 
a forge, and near him another young man of the same 
tribe, and about the same age, bending over a wheel- 
wright's bench. The latter's name is Maquimetas, and 
these two, when they return to their people next year, 
propose to go into business at their reservation as part- 
ners. Peters, however, has evidently a very aspiring 
temperament, and is reluctant to leave his Alma Mater. 
He talks of returning to her after his term has expired, 
in order to go through another three years' course. Pe- 



INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION OF INDIANS. 355 

ters and Maquimetas have constructed without anj help 
several wagons and carts, which bear comparison with 
the work of white mechanics. One of the former, to- 
gether with some wheelbarrows made by Indian students, 
has been sent to the Mechanics' Fair at Boston. 

And, in describing the general w^ork and object of the 
institution, the same writer declares that he has given 
much time to the examination, and was fascinated with 
the effort. The object of the training is practical knowl- 
edge and skill. It is essentially and wisely an industrial 
scliool. It is provided with excellent workshops, and 
three farms are attached to it. Students earn by labor a 
part of their tuition and board fees. At the same time 
they gain an invaluable knowledge of their chosen trades. 
For the Indians, this branch of their instruction is of the 
greatest importance. The logic of industry is the first 
thing taught them, and it would be impossible to esti- 
mate the prospects of these races when brought under 
such influences."^ 

The individual resources of intellect and the fortitude 
which are developed in the acquisitions of settled society 

* " They study or recite from half -past eight in the morning till twelve. 
From one to six p. m. they work. In the evening there arc games, conver- 
sation-classes, and religious meetings. The girls are taught to sew, make 
and mend their own clothes (most of them now can make their own), take 
cooking-lessons, and do house-work, washing and ironing, as well as our 
best colored girls. They are particular in washing dishes and setting 
tables, but are rather slow about it. 

" The boys are taught farming, for which most generous provision, by 
way of a three-hundred-and-fifty-acre farm, has been made by a generous 
Boston friend. 

" Two are learning the printer's trade, four the wheelwright and black- 
smith's trade. The fifteen in the Indian shop are at carpentery, shoemak- 
ing and mending, and harness-repairing. They make all the tables and tin- 

\ 



356 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

can not be wholly denied to these descendants of the races 
who manufactured beautiful vases and constructed mounds 
like that at Cholula. The Cherokees, Menomonees, Win- 
nebagoes, and Six JN^ations have made a favorable impres- 
sion upon the people of the United States. Leaving out 
of question all other efforts to educate and civilize the 
races still extant, it must be confessed that the effort at 
Hampton Beach transcends any other in the four centu- 
ries since their discovery. It is a message of peace more 
powerful than all the soldiers in the Western garrisons. 
The latter will be long necessary for protection, for the 
growth will necessarily be slow ; but a beginning in the 
right direction, if sustained and persevered in and effect- 
ually carried out, can but result in the gradual triumph 
of our arts and civilization over the whole continent, and 
among all the races and tribes that inhabit it, and the 
Indian will yet eclipse all the preindustrial achievements 
of the great and enlightened races from which he has 
descended. 

Among the evils which are said to prevail in many of 
the public schools, none is more frequently censured than 



ware, and do the small jobs in painting and glazing. Indians have a knack 
in leather-work. I can show you a one-horse cart and a plain two-story 
house built by Indian boys. 

" Like the girls, they are neat and tidy, but slow. A boy will make a 
perfect mortise, but is too long about it. 

" At first they soon tire, for their muscles arc not trained to steady 
day's work. After two years they are equal to ten hours' labor. But they 
will not soon get the Anglo-Saxon's gift of endurance or continuousness. 
They measure larger at the hips, and less relatively at the chest, than 
whites. All the tinted races seem weak at the lungs, being most sensitive 
to change of surroundings. Consumption is the great enemy." — {General 
Armstrong's address in Boston^ October^ 1880.) 



THE CRAMMING PROCESS. 357 

the cramming process. Newspapers and public speakers 
have exhausted tlie vocabularies of invective in showing 
the nature and extent of the evil, and examples are pub- 
lished from time to time of the sufferings and diseases 
engendered by over-study. I^ot long since T. W. Hig- 
ginson startled the community by an article in the At- 
lantic Monthly upon the "Murder of the Innocents," 
and public attention was soon afterward called to the 
death of two pupils, one from brain-fever and the other 
by suicide, both resulting from mental excitement and too 
much application to study. Indeed, it is a familiar source 
of complaint. The evil has undoubtedly been greatly ex- 
aggerated, and there is reason to believe that it is often 
seized upon where the fact does not exist, or as an excuse 
for deficiency and over-indulgence. But, after making 
all allowances, its consequences upon the imderstanding 
and strength of the pupils can not safely be ignored. 
The exercise of the intellectual powers is as healthy an 
exercise as is that of the body, but it is undeniable that 
over-study in children whose brains and physical system 
are developing can only be pursued to the serious detri- 
ment of their health. In his recent work on the " Dis- 
eases of Modern Life," Dr. B. W. Eichardson says that 
the endeavor to fill too hastily the minds of children with 
artificial information leads to one of two results. 'Not 
infrequently in the very young it gives rise to direct dis- 
ease of the brain itself, to deposit of tubercle if there be 
a predisposition to that disease, to convulsive attacks, or 
even to epilepsy. In less extreme cases it causes simple 
weakness and exhaustion of the mental organs, with irreg- 
ularity of power. The child may grow up with a mem- 
ory taxed with technicals impressed so forcibly that it is 



358 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

hard to make way for other knowledge. Added to these 
mischiefs there may be, and often is, the further evil that 
the brain, owing to the labor put upon it, becomes too 
fully and easily developed, too firm^ and too soon mature. 
It remains throughout life a large child's brain, very won- 
derful for power in a child, but very weak in a man or 
woman ; and the doctor concludes as follows : 

" Overwork in the child and in the student defeats 
its own object. It does not develop the powerful brain 
80 necessary for the man, for life is ever a new and great 
lesson, and some young brain nmst be left free for the 
reception of lesson on lesson. But the danger of over- 
work is, unfortunately, not confined to the brain ; it ex- 
tends to the body as a whole. AVhen the brain is over- 
worked in the growing child, however well the child may 
be fed and clothed and cared for, there will be over waste 
of substance in proportion to the overwork. There will 
be stunted growth and a bad physical body." 

Now, the practical advantage of industrial education 
as an antidote to this evil is beginning to attract much 
attention, and its remedial agencies are particularly in- 
voked to prevent or mitigate the excessive use of one 
organ at the expense of the entire body. A Boston school 
committee, appointed for the purpose of investigating the 
subject, expressed their conviction that the introduction 
of manual teaching into the school system will serve as 
an excellent means of preventing over-study. It asso- 
ciates the mental with the material, the exercise of the 
body with the mind, and thus carries on the symmetrical 
education of the whole humanity. 

One of the best results will be the interest which chil- 
dren take in the nature of objects and in making things ; 



THE ANTIDOTE FOR OVER-STUDY. 359 

it will also serve to relieve the mind from, perhaps, dry 
studies and long tasks and severe discipline, which only 
disgust and weary them. There is also an especial ad- 
vantage in training the hand and the eye in some useful 
vocation that will not only improve the health, but enable 
the pupils to become self-supj^orting, independent, and 
thoroughly competent for the useful duties of life. The 
partial course of industrial training introduced into some 
of the schools in Philadelphia as well as Boston have 
given the most gratifying results. And the superintend- 
ent of the Industrial Home School at Washington has 
stated as a fact that children rarely asked to be excused 
from school ; and, although four half-days in the week 
were devoted to instructions in various industries, their 
standard in public-school studies was fully up to the aver- 
age, proving that a well-arranged system of interchange- 
able mental and manual training was not only practical, 
but decidedly advantageous to the pupil. The examina- 
tion in the various industries taught — practical questions 
on shoemaking, in gardening, sewing, cooking, house- 
keeping, carpentering, etc. — presented a novel and inter- 
esting innovation upon the conventional examinations in 
other institutions. 

The effect of educated workmanship upon the condi- 
tion of the worker is a consideration of the greatest im- 
portance. We are familiar with the contests of labor. 
On one side of this interminable controversy it stands 
grim and hostile, while capital leads the other and gen- 
erally conquers. By labor in the sense of this conflict I 
mean those who go through life without any of the supe- 
riority or disinterestedness conferred by knowledge or by 
the habit of thought which knowledge inspires. They 



360 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

are satisfied to do as they and theirs have always done 
before them, and so they work and drudge on with a 
vague presentiment that all improvement in the manu- 
factures or trades in which they toil is hostile to their 
interests. They belong to a class that would smash ma- 
chinery or break into strikes when they can result in no 
benefit to themselves, and which sometimes are followed 
by proscriptions of those who are guilty of no crime but 
that of a willingness to work. Educated labor occupies 
higher ground and understands better the economic rela- 
tions of industry. He who professes honest, high-minded 
work, however humble his calling, is inevitably imbued 
with the spirit he breathes into it, and his mind harmo- 
nizes -with the execution of its design. He is impressed 
with a spirit of fairness and justice beyond the compre- 
hension and rough ethics of those less intelligent in his 
art, and he therefore carries the discipline of study into 
the exercise of his workmanship under the bright ambi- 
tion of improving his condition and beholding his chil- 
dren educated to his own standard. A man of less infor- 
mation may vaguely wish for much beyond his reach, 
and ask for something better in the way of the substan- 
tial goods of life, for his labor is wholly task-work. He 
probably was industrious, honest, and fair-minded origi- 
nally, but the disadvantages of his situation have insen- 
sibly embittered and soured his nature ; and his ordinary 
conversation becomes the vehicle of heart-burnings and 
jaundiced pictures of realities at all times sufficiently som- 
ber. In this state of fostered irritability he toils on in a 
helpless sort of way, blaming his employer, denouncing 
capital, and lending himself to plots and cabals which end 
in breaking the hearts of his family, and leaving his ani- 



APPLICATION OF ART TO INDUSTRY. 361 

mal spirits somewhere on the hard track of disappoint- 
ment and poverty. 

But a workman, well informed in the theory of his 
art, and able and willing to practice it, has higher mo- 
tives and aspirations ; for he is not only sure of the high- 
est wages, but he knows that skill like his paves the road 
that leads to success, and that the accomplished artisan is 
sure that his various perfections will be appreciated and 
rewarded. Indeed, I do not see why, w^hen he is artistic 
in his skill, he should not rank wdth those having the 
impulse of a gentleman, or even with the professional 
classes, so called. 

The application of art to industry until of late years 
existed only as a tradition. When manufacturing pro- 
cesses were developed in modern Europe, the term utility 
was made vaguely significant of the arts and devices of 
mere physical comfort, and the use of art, especially 
among Anglo-Saxons, was regarded as unimportant, if not 
frivolous. We are beginning to appreciate its appliance, 
and few things can now be named in which its graceful 
touch can be dispensed with. When we contemplate its 
effect in conducting all branches of industry, as it has 
been exemplified in Europe and to a less degree in the 
United States, upon the condition of the workers them- 
selves, it is impossible to conjecture their ultimate prog- 
ress in social and material prosperity. The painters, 
sculptors, and architects who made Italy, Flanders, and 
Germany famous for the higher forms of art at the 
period of the Kenaissance, executed with their own hands 
designs for carpets, furniture, doors, hinges, and also in 
metal ; and their pieces in bronze, in gold, silver, and in 
chasing are among the choicest specimens in our art-col- 



362 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

lections. Guido, Michael Angelo, and Raphael were in 
the truest sense laboring artists, and did not scorn occa- 
sionally to furnish beautiful designs for the decoration of 
articles devoted to the useful purposes of life. We wit- 
ness something like this revived. In the finest work of 
ornamentation the designing is performed by men of 
culture and long training. The painters in the establish- 
ment of the Messrs. Minton receive large salaries for the 
creations of their pencils upon precious pieces of porce- 
lain, with invaluable delineations outlined upon them, 
which pass through the world for their beauty. 

In a late number (1882) of the " L'Art Revue,'' two 
engravings are presented of pieces of furniture that were 
made in the times of Louis XIY and Louis XYI. They 
are etched by Leon Goucherad, and an editorial remarks 
that it is only in France that so distinguished an artist 
would take for his subject a piece of furniture, and not 
consider it derogatory to his calling. But art is art in 
France, and the artist never considers any subject un- 
worthy of his pencil. The true artist comprehends art 
in all its various stages, and he takes the same interest in 
commonplace subjects when they can translate his ideas 
into form. 

In the United States fine art has not associated with 
industry. They have seldom moved together. The art- 
ist has intrenched himself in a circle that touches no other 
circumference. But the growing desire for ornamenta- 
tion, and to bestow the beautiful forms of art upon arti- 
cles for common use, can only be interpreted as evidence 
of a great change in public taste, which will ultimately 
dispel this constant divergence, and bring together these 
two elements so essential to our progress and refinement. 



APPLICATION OF ART TO INDUSTRY. S6S 

And, indeed, if the design of higher art is to embellish 
human existence, why can it disdain to recognize the 
stupendous interests which spring from the industries of 
this affluent nation? The desire which stimulates the 
growing taste for what is beautiful in common things is 
educating the public mind to appreciate, by a natural ad- 
justment, the finest work of the artist, and to imbue all 
with a critical knowledge of his creations, and thus to 
increase his patrons upon an almost incredible scale of 
magnitude. There is no extravagance of fancy in the 
belief that art-industry is destined to produce greater re- 
sults upon the fine arts than the fine arts will ever pro- 
duce upon it, and that it has already elaborated a taste 
for them which has not been reciprocated, and which can 
not hereafter be eradicated. It has produced perfect fac- 
similes of the finest engravings, and multiplied the works 
of the great masters, and reproduced the faces and figures 
of antique art in no respect inferior to the original, at a 
mere nominal cost ; and busts and statues, palaces and 
cathedrals, spring from the picture-surface according to 
the optical powers applied to them ; and the illustrated 
newspapers throw off any number of impressions pictori- 
ally delineating the main transactions of the great world. 

Art-industry, regarded merely in its economics, sim- 
plicity, and accuracy, must be considered among the most 
humanizing accomplishments of mankind. Its relation to 
the fine arts is only distinguishable as going before them 
in the necessities of life and in the facilities which it pre- 
sents to the masses of the people in its various employ- 
ments and discoveries. 

Cultivation refines the sensibilities, and has the same 
general effect upon all minds. There is a unity, not 



364: EDUCATION IX ITS KELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

only in all the arts, but the same thing is observable in 
art and science. Each courts the other, and their union 
is often thought to be indispensable. We know that the 
same study often involves a science and an art. What 
could have been known of the laws of chemistry, if the 
instruments furnished by art had not separated its ele- 
ments and brought them home to our cognizance ? The 
telescope, the mariner's quadrant, and the air-pump come 
from the workshop, as do all the instruments of precision 
which have contributed so immensely to the original stock 
of human knowledge. 

In these instances, and in many others, Science and 
Art go hand in hand like sisters. The skilled and intel- 
ligent working-classes will find that they occupy a much 
greater share of human enjoyment and honor, and that 
the line dividing those engaged in the useful pursuits of 
life from those engaged in intellectual industry will ap- 
pear less and less in a disadvantageous light. The true, 
the beautiful, and the good are sources of unfailing pleas- 
ure, and the culture of the heart brings a noble recom- 
pense which is to be prized more than w^ealth without 
the tastes which should accompany it. The man of men- 
tal industry and the man of skilled industry stand in a 
fortunate position, between the sordid rich and the sordid 
poor, for they possess a consciousness of knowledge and 
refinement unknown to the possessors of tasteless wealth, 
or the helplessness of ignorant poverty. The artist, the 
artisan, the scholar, and the philosopher are advancing 
slowly but steadily into the world's sympathies and its 
busy intercourse. They who think and w^ork are the 
classes that produce the literature of the times, and whose 
acts will become the history of the future. Study and 



THE WORKING-MAN'S BEST HOPE. 365 

the exercise of its arts no longer drift into the eddies of 
life while the stream of wealth and honor pass bj. The 
artificer of material work and the artiiicer of thought 
are engaged in the same object, only in different degrees 
of effort; but of the same general nature. The difference 
is between the work of the hand and the work of the 
brain; and, in comparing the two, the former is rising 
higher and higher in the scale of intellectual enjoyment, 
and is assuming consideration socially in proportion to 
the elements of taste and beauty which it applies to the 
material conditions of life. Thousands of women trained 
in our art-schools are rescued from dependence and want, 
and have learned almost unconsciously that life is worth 
living; and thousands of men skilled in their calling 
have been raised to a level of the best educated and the 
most fully informed of those in commercial or profes- 
sional life. 

Indeed, industrial education is the working-man's best 
friend and hope in the world ; and the advantages which 
it holds out for his improvement are practically endless. 
By means of it he may expect not only to realize greater 
perfection in his work, but also an advance in his social 
relations ; for when art and skill in any direction what- 
ever are developed, they are and must be accompanied by 
an education of general taste, and an improvement in 
mind and manners, that will bring him abreast with the 
best associates in his immediate society. 



APPENDIX. 

Extract from the Annual Catalogue^ 1881-82, of the School 
for Manual Instruction of Washington University, St. 
Louis, referred to in Chapter V, 



THE THEORY OF SHOP-WORK. 

The application of the educational idea to mechanic arts 
is strictly analogous to its application to chemistry and phys- 
ics. In each, the use of apparatus and the treatment of 
material is taught by systematic experiments in suitable 
laboratories. In each, everything is an-anged for the pur- 
pose of giving instruction in the principles involved, and 
for acquiring skill in manipulation, and not for the sake of 
the production of salable compounds of either drugs or ap- 
paratus. 

Chemical laboratories might be manufactories, and mix- 
tures might be made for sale, but the efficiency of such a 
laboratory for the purpose of education would be very small. 
So a manufacturing establishment can be made a place for 
instruction in the use of tools, but its cost would be great 
in proportion to its capacity, and the variety of work would 
be limited by its business. 

SPECIAL trades ARE [N^OT TAUGHT. 

The scope of a single trade is too narrow for educational 
purposes. Manual education should be as broad and liberal 



368 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

as intellectual. A shop which manufactures for the market 
and expects a revenue from the sale of its products, is neces- 
sarily confined to salable work, and a systematic and pro- 
gressive series of lessons is impossible, except at great cost. 
If the object of the shop is education, a student should be 
allowed to discontinue any task or process the moment he 
has learned to do it well. If the shop were intended to 
make money, the students would be kept at work on what 
they could do best, at the expense of breadth and versa- 
tility. 

It is claimed that students take more interest in work- 
ing upon something which, when finished, has intrinsic 
value, than they do in abstract exercises. This is quite 
possible, and proper use should be made of this fact ; but 
if all education were limited to such practical examples, 
our schools would be useless. The idea of a school is that 
pupils are to be graded and taught in classes ; the result 
aimed at being, not at all the objective product or finished 
work, but the intellectual and physical growth which comes 
from the exercise. Of what use is the elaborate solution in 
algebra, the minute drawing, or the faithful translation, 
after it is well done ? Do we not erase the one, and burn 
the other, with the clear conviction that the only thing of 
value was the discipline, and that that is indestructible ? 

So in manual education, the desired end is the acquire- 
ment of skill in the use of tools and materials, and not the 
production of specific articles ; thence we abstract all the 
mechanical processes and manual arts and typical tools of 
the trades and occupations of men, arrange a systematic 
course of instruction in the same, and then incorporate it 
into our system of education. 

Thus, without teaching any one trade, we teach the 
essential mechanical principles of all. In accordance with 
the foregoing principles, the shoj)-training is gained by 



APPENDIX. 369 

regular and carefully graded lessons designed to cover as 
much ground as possible, and to teach thoroughly the uses 
of ordinary tools. This does not imply the attainment of 
sufficient skill to produce either the fine work or the rapid- 
ity of a skilled mechanic ; this is left to after-years. But 
the knowledge of how a tool or machine should be used is 
easily and thoroughly taught. The mechanical products 
or results of such lessons have little or no value when com- 
pleted, and hence the shops do not attempt to manufacture 
for the market. 

As has been said, work of immediate utility is of greater 
interest to students than abstract lessons. Such work has 
an undoubted value, and is in many ways desirable, pro- 
vided it does not hinder or interfere with regular instruc- 
tion. Opportunities for such constructive work are con- 
stantly occurring. The wants of a large institution are 
many, and when they can be supplied by student skill it is 
a benefit to all concerned. In this way, outside the stated 
hours, pupils have the means of applying their knowledge 
and of gaining additional practice. The yearly aggregate 
of such productions is quite large, and it affords undeniable 
evidence of the efficiency of systematic instruction. 

DETAILS OF SH0P-IN^STRUCTI0:N". 

The shop-instruction is given similarly to laboratory lec- 
tures. The instructor at the bench, machine, forge, or anvil 
executes in the presence of the whole class the day's lesson, 
giving all needed instructions, and at times using the black- 
board. 

When necessary, the pupils make notes and sketches, 
and questions are asked and answered, that all obscurities 
may be removed. The class then proceeds to the execution 
of the task, leaving the instructor to give additional help to 
such as need it. 
17 



370 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

At a specified time that lesson ceases, the work is brought 
in, commented on and marked. It is not necessary that all 
the work assigned should be finished ; the essential thing 
is, that it should be well begun and carried on with reason- 
able speed and accuracy. 

It is almost useless to say that the personal character- 
istics of pupils are even more marked in this work than in 
any ordinary recitation, from the fact that no text-books 
are used, nor is there previous study. The length of time 
required by different pupils in a large class for the doing of 
a specified piece of work varies considerably. Hence addi- 
tional lessons or constructive work is arranged for the bright- 
er and quicker members. 

Work in the blacksmith-shop is in one essential feature 
different from any other kind. Wood or cold iron will wait 
any desired length of time while the pupil considers how 
he shall work ; but here comes in temperature, subject to 
continual change. 

The injunction is imperative to " strike while the iron 
is hot," and hence quick work is demanded — a hard thing 
for new hands. 

To obviate this difficulty bars of lead are used, with 
which the lesson is first executed, while all the particulars 
of holding and striking are studied. The lead acts under 
the hammer very nearly like hot iron, and will permit of 
every operation of the blacksmith-shop except welding. 
Much is anticipated from its use as a preparation for the 
working of iron, as each lesson is first executed in lead. 

One of the most difficult lessons in the art of the smith 
is that of managing the fire. The various kinds of heat 
are explained and illustrated, and habits of economy of both 
iron and fuel are inculcated. 



APPENDIX. 371 



HOW THE USE OF TOOLS IS TAUGHT. 

Frequent requests have been made for detailed descrip- 
tions or drawings of the models actually used in the several 
shops. Such requests have generally been refused, for sev- 
eral good reasons. In the first place, the main object of 
one or more lessons is to gain control and mastery of the 
tool in hand, and not the production of a particular model. 
The use of the tool may be well taught by a large variety 
of exercises, just as a knowledge of bank discount may be 
gained from the use of several different examples. No 
special merit can be claimed for a particular example ; nei- 
ther can a particular model or series of models have any 
great value. No good teacher is likely to use precisely the 
same set twice. 

Again, the metliod of doing a piece of work, and not the 
finished piece, may be the object of a lesson. To illustrate: 
Directions are given to a class in carpentry to saw a piece 
of wood, holding it upon the bench-dog. A pupil is found 
attempting to do the work holding it on a trestle. On 
being corrected, he insists that he can't do it so well in 
that way. The teacher replies, or should reply, ^^Then 
that is the way you should do it, until you can do it well." 
jSTow, the exercises by which certain methods of using tools 
are to be taught, often depend upon varying circumstances, 
such as the quality of the material, the age of pupils, and 
the pupils' knowledge of working drawings. Instead of 
giving particular descriptions of exercises, we prefer to 
state the general methods by which the use of the various 
tools is taught. 

The tools are not given out all at once ; they are issued 
as they are needed, and to all the members of the class 
alike. 



372 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

In carpenter-work the tools used are the cross-cut, ten- 
on, and rip saws, steel square, try square, bevel and gauge, 
hammer, mallet, knife, rule and dividers, oil-stones, and 
slips ; and of edge-tools, the jack- and smoothing-planes, 
the chisels and gouges. Braces and bits, jointer-planes, 
compass-saws, hatchets, and other tools, are kept in the 
shop tool-closet, to be used as needed. 

The saw and the plane, with the square and gauge, are 
the foundation tools, and to drill the pupils in their use nu- 
merous lessons are given, varied only enough to avoid monot- 
ony. The pupil being able to plane a piece fairly well and 
to keep to the line in sawing, the next step is to teach him 
to add the use of the chisel in producing simple joints of 
various kinds. The particular shapes are given with the 
intent to familiarize the pupil with the customary styles 
and methods of construction. 

The different sizes of the same tool — chisels, for in- 
stance — require different care and methods of handling, and 
the means of overcoming irregularities and defects in mate- 
rial form another chapter in the instruction to be given. 

With the introduction of each tool, the pupils are taught 
how to keep the same in order. They are taught that sharp 
tools are absolutely necessary to good work ; to make them 
realize this is a most difficult task. 

TURNING. 

In a general way, much that has already been stated ap- 
plies to wood-turning. Five or six tools only are used, and, 
from previous experience, the pupils know how to keep 
them in order. At first a large gouge only is issued, and 
the pupils are taught and drilled in its use in roughing out 
and producing right-line figures ; then convex and concave 
surfaces ; then in work comprising all these — all in wood- 



APPENDIX. 373 

turning with the grain. A wide chisel follows, and its use 
in conjunction with the gouge is taught. 

After this a smaller gouge, chisel, and parting tool, and 
a round-point are given, and a variety of shapes are exe- 
cuted. Next comes turning across the grain ; then bored 
and hollow work ; next, chucking, and the various ways of 
manipulating wood on face-plates, chucks, mandrels, etc. ; 
finally, turning of fancy woods, polishing, jointing, and 
pattern-work. 

Of the course in iron-work, nothing must as yet be said, 
for the reason that we desire to speak only of work gone 
over, and that department is not yet fully developed. 

THE ORIGIl^ AXD PURPOSE OF THE SCHOOL. 

The Manual Training School owes its existence to the 
conviction, on the part of its founders, that the interests of 
St. Louis demand for young men a system of education 
which shall fit them for the actual duties of life, in a more 
direct and positive manner than is done in the ordinary 
American school. 

We see, in the future, an increasing demand for thor- 
oughly trained men to take positions in manufacturing es- 
tablishments as superintendents, as foremen, and as skilled 
workmen. The youth of to-day are to be the men of the 
next generation. It is important that we keep their prob- 
able life-work in view, in providing for their education. 
Excellent as are our established schools, both public and 
private, it must be admitted that they still leave something 
to be desired ; they do not, and probably they can not, cover 
the whole ground. 

It is believed that, to all students, without regard to 
plans for the future, the value of the training which can be 
got in shop-work, spending only from four to twelve hours 



374 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

per week, is abundantly sufficient to justify the expense of 
materials, tools, and expert teachers. 

It is very well understood that many students can not 
wisely undertake the full course of intellectual study now 
laid down for the regular classes of a college or polytechnic 
school. It occasionally happens that students who have 
special aptitudes in certain directions, find great difficulty 
in mastering subjects in other direction. In such cases it 
is often the best course to yield to natural tastes, and to as- 
sist the student in finding his proper sphere of work and 
study. A decided aptitude for handicraft is not unfre- 
quently coupled with a strong aversion to and unfitness for 
abstract and theoretical investigations. 

There can be no doubt that, in such cases, more time 
should be spent in the shop and less in the lecture and reci- 
tation room. 

One great object of the school is to foster a higher ap- 
preciation of the value and dignity of intelligent labor, and 
the worth and respectability of laboring-men. A boy who 
sees nothing in manual labor but mere brute force, despises 
both the labor and the laborer. With the acquisition of 
skill in himself comes the ability and the willingness to 
recognize skill in his fellows. When once he appreciates 
skill in handicraft, he regards the workman with sympathy 
and respect. 

In a manual training-school, tool-work never descends 
into drudgery. The tasks are not long, nor are they unne- 
cessarily repeated. In this school, whatever may be the so- 
cial standing or importance of the fathers, the sons go to- 
gether to the same work, and are tested physically, as well 
as intellectually, by the same standards. The result in the 
past has been, and in the future it will continue to be, a 
truer estimate of laboring and manufacturing people, and a 
sounder judgment on all social problems. 



APPENDIX. 375 



APPENDIX SECOND TO CHAPTER V. 

" The Imperial Technical School of Moscow is a high- 
class special school, principally intended for the education 
of mechanical constructors, mechanical engineers, and tech- 
nical engineers. 

*' The school consists of two divisions, general and spe- 
cial, each of which has a course of three years. The special 
division is divided into three branches — mechanical con- 
struction, mechanical engineering, and technological engi- 
neering. 

"The three years' course of the general division em- 
braces the following subjects : Religion, free-hand and 
linear drawing, descriptive geometry, general physics, 
zoology, botany, mineralogy, chemistry, geodesy, analyti- 
cal geometry, higher algebra, differential and integral cal- 
culus, general mechanics, drawing of machine-parts, the 
French and German languages, i. e., all scientific subjects, 
the previous knowledge of which is required from the pu- 
pils of all the three following branches. 

" In the special department, the three years' course of 
the three branches contains the following subjects : Or- 
ganic and analytical chemistry, metallurgy, practical phys- 
ics, mechanical and chemical technology, technics of wood 
and metals, analytical mechanics, construction of ma- 
chines, practical mechanics, railway construction, engi- 
neering and constructive art, projecting and estimating 
of machines, works, and mills, industrial statistics, and 
book-keeping. 

" A fourth division is designed exclusively for the edu- 
cation of foremen (contremaitres), and is called the Practi- 
cal Section. It is reserved for pupils who have received 



376 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

good marks for conduct and for manual work, but whose 
theoretical attainments are insufficient for the require- 
ments of the third class. Instead of passing into this, 
they are put in the Practical Section, where much more 
attention is paid to workshop practice. The whole dura- 
tion of their studies is then only three years. 

" Every one of the appointed sciences is taught fully, 
or in a condensed form, according as it is considered a fun- 
damental or collateral subject of the given branch. The 
students of all the classes are occupied during a stated time 
in practical work in the laboratories and mechanical work- 
shops. 

"Admission into the school as boarder or day scholar is 
obtained by competitive examination, in accordance with 
the ordained programme. 

" Pupils who have passed through the full school course 
of the gymnasiums may be admitted without further exami- 
nation to the lectures of the second general class of the 
school, but pupils of the last class of the gymnasiums, who 
have not passed their final examinations, are admitted only 
to the first general class of the school. 

'^The pupils wear the appointed half -military uni- 
form. 

" Pupils who have obtained in the school the appointed 
grades receive acknowledged rights in the service of the 
government. 

" The school is maintained by funds from the follow- 
ing sources : Percentage on funded capital,* fees of private 
boarders and foreign hearers, and profits received from the 
mechanical works. 

*' The annual receipts of the school amount to $160,000. 

" The annual expenses of the school amount to $140,000. 

* The school capital amounts to about $2,030,000. 



APPENDIX. 377 

** The technical school is under the immediate patronage 
of their Imperial Majesties. 

*' Auxiliaries to Instruction. — The school possesses a 
special library, containing more than six thousand volumes 
of works on specialties, a cabinet of physics, two chemical 
laboratories, a cabinet of mechanical models, a cabinet of 
natural history, extensive mechanical works with separate 
smithy and foundry, and also school workshops. 

"No one will deny that a close acquaintance with hand 
labor, and, in general, practical experience in mechanical 
works, are matters of the utmost importance to every en- 
gineer.* The drawings of an engineer thus trained will 
always be distinguished by solidity and that practical judg- 
ment which is the result not only of the study of scientific 
truths, but also of the acquirement of a certain familiarity 
in their application to practice. That the knowledge of 
hand-labor is of extreme importance to a young man de- 
voting himself to technical activity, and that it is consid- 
ered an absolute necessity to him, we are convinced by the 
circumstance that the greater number of the polytechnic 
schools of Western Europe demand from the students who 
enter them either a previous stay, of a certain duration, at 
some works of industry, or issue to them a diploma, attest- 
ing their accomplishment of the course, after they are in 
position to show that they have been occupied practically 
for a definite period at some such works on their leaving 
the school, t 

*^If we contemplate the matter itself more profoundly, 
and acquaint ourselves more closely with the circumstances 

* We speak here of mechanical engineers and constructors, 
f This statement is decried by Professor Ludwig, of the Slunich Poly- 
technic School, than whom no man is in a better position to judge. 



378 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

of the practician at private works and mills, we must, dis- 
regarding exceptional cases, since it is not those which form 
the rule, arrive at the sad conclusion that a young man, 
desiring to acquire practical experience in a short time, and 
without the aid of an experienced guide, loses, at private 
works, nine tenths of his whole time entirely unprofitably. 
As we are at present addressing persons well acquainted 
with this matter, we do not consider it necessary to bring 
forward arguments in support of our statement. The prac- 
tical information acquired in works by a young man before 
entering a poly technical school is very inconsiderable, and 
therefore does not possess the desired significance. 

*' Such information is, on account of its defectiveness, 
of little assistance in promoting the study at school of prac- 
tical mechanics — the construction of machines, or the draw- 
ing up of plans and estimates for mills and works. 

*^ A young man on leaving a polytechnic school should 
endeavor to carry on his practical education ; should fix 
upon some mill or works in which, being, in the majority 
of cases, of course, left to his own initiative, he may find 
place and opportunity for his further self-education. 

"At this moment, so critical in the career of the youth- 
ful engineer, the insufficiency of material resources is the 
cause that the majority take service, at a very low rate of 
remuneration, as draughtsmen in the drawing-office of me- 
chanical works, or in the drawing-offices of railway compa- 
nies ; others, more fortunate, enter works in the quality of 
artisans ; but even they are hardly to be envied, simply 
from the fact that in the majority of cases the specialty of 
the first works which they happen to enter becomes their 
own specialty through life. An experienced observer will 
find no difficulty in perceiving all the inconveniences to a 
technical education which arise as the result of such an or- 
der of things. Let us explain this by examples : A young 



APPENDIX. 379 

man, having received thorough scientific preparation in a 
polytechnic school, has entered as artisan practician some 
extensive joiner- works, and in a year or two begins to serve 
in the capacity of a workman, receiving pay from the works. 
If, from any circumstance whatever, he becomes deprived 
of his place, he finds it necessary to seek another in a simi- 
lar joiner-works, or else to enter again as practician in an- 
other specialty, for instance, a locomotive, boiler, or other 
works. The material resources of young men preclude, in 
the majority of cases, the possibility of their deciding on 
the latter alternative. 

"If the observant directors of polytechnic schools should 
take upon themselves the work of following the industrial 
career of the contingent of their pupils who on leaving 
school enter a drawing-office, they would easily perceive that 
those young people experience extreme difficulty, when they 
are once engaged there, in leaving such an office, and in the 
majority of cases remain draughtsmen all their lives. In 
such offices a young man acquires but very inconsiderable 
technical information, neither can they in any way serve 
him as practical schools for his further self-instruction. 
And we must here observe, also, that the more extensive 
the works, and consequently the drawing-office attached, 
the fewer are the advantages offered to the young practician, 
since he has to do with an institution in which division of 
labor, forming an essential principle, will not admit of his 
becoming speedily acquainted with the general progress of 
work. We can not but add that this principle, having 
become latterly extensively applied in all large works and 
mills, though on the one hand bringing considerable mate- 
rial advantages to the proprietors, has, on the other, greatly 
influenced the depreciation of the level of technical knowl- 
edge among the workmen, by confining that knowledge 
within the limits of narrow specialization. 



380 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

*'The teclinical education afforded to young men in 
almost all the polytechnic schools of Europe leaves, theo- 
retically speaking, little to desire, but is exceedingly imper- 
fect practically, and demands the particular attention of 
those persons who are intrusted with such instruction. 

'^ The peculiar circumstances by which the young peo- 
ple who have finished the course of the polytechnicums 
find themselves surrounded do not admit, before their en- 
tering upon an active life, of the acquirement of even a 
superficial general practical education, but place them in 
the necessity of devoting all their activity from the first 
day of their leaving school, and often their whole life, to a 
narrow specialty. The attention of the directors of poly- 
technic schools has often been drawn to this, and attempts 
have frequently been made to familiarize young people at 
school with the practical work of mechanics, but all these 
endeavors have proved to be unattended with success, from 
the following reasons : 

'*1. The school-workshops for the practical occupation 
of the students were constructed on a very miniature and 
inconsiderable scale. 

'*2. The consequent want of room in these workshops 
did not admit of all the students being occupied at the 
same time, and therefore their attendance was not obliga- 
tory, while the majority of the professors and masters ex- 
pressed their disapprobation of such employment. 

*^3. There existed no systematic method of practical 
instruction in the workshops similar to that which had 
been applied to the practical teaching in the chemical labo- 
ratories. 

^'4. The material resources assigned for the mainte- 
nance of the school- workshops were very inadequate. 

"5. The time allowed for the full course of study in 
the polytechnic schools was insuflQcient to admit of the 



APPENDIX. 381 

combination, in that course, of theoretical with practical 
instruction in technology. 

"Though [before the year 1873] there had appeared 
some literary articles against the introduction of practical 
instruction with workshops into the higher technical schools, 
yet it is our subjective opinion that those articles appeared 
only in defense of the existing order of things, and to jus- 
tify a certain lukewarmness in introducing advantageous 
measures, but no demonstration of the results of trial were 
afforded among the arguments against such a mode of 
instruction, for the simple reason that, excepting feeble 
attempts, no serious experiments had [then] been made. 
Even those attempts themselves were made without any 
particular energy and due observation. 

" We do not here take into calculation some of the at 
present existing technical schools of France, which possess 
sufficiently extensive school- workshops,* because those 
schools belong rather to the lower-class technical institu- 
tions, and do not give to the world mechanical engineers 
and constructors, but only foremen {contremaitres). 

"The slight acquaintance of learned technologists with 
practical work in mechanical workshops entails the unfortu- 
nate consequence that, in the greater number of even very 
extensive works, the practical part remains in the hands of 
routined artisans, who have received no scientific instruc- 
tion, but who have attained their exceptional position by 
accustoming themselves during the course of many years to 
the most obsolete methods of practice in the mechanical art. 

"The Imperial Technical School of Moscow, the course 
of which, from the theoretical subjects taught therein, 
equals the course of many of the polytechnic schools of 

* These are the schools of Chalons, Aix, and Angers. 



382 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

Western Europe, combines theoretical with, practical edu- 
cation, and consequently is enabled to present real proofs 
of the possibility and advantageousness of such combina- 
tion, since the trial of this combination has been made on 
an extensive scale, and during a considerable length of time. 

^' For the practical education of young men in the two 
branches — mechanical engineers and mechanical construct- 
ors* — the school possesses large mechanical works with 
hired workmen, accepting and carrying out orders from 
private individuals and on a commercial footing, for the 
construction of steam-engines, working-engines, pumps, 
transmission apparatus, agricultural machines, etc. f 

** The works consist of the following shops : Joiners' 
shop, engineers' shop, erectors' shop, painters' shop, a large 
forge with steel hammer and fan-blast, iron-foundry with 
furnace for three thousand kilogrammes of metal, and brass- 
foundry ; the works have also a drawing-office and count- 
ing-house attached to them. 

"A steam-engine of thirty horse-power is used for the 
working of the place, while the foundry, with fan-blast and 
coal-pulverizing mill, is worked by an engine of ten horse- 
power. 

"The works are under the management of the head 
mechanical engineer [M. Malicheff], and his assistant, Pla- 
tonoff, mechanical engineer. The drawing-office is in the 
charge of M. Gans, mechanical engineer. . . . 

** These works, being within the walls of the institution 
itself, and managed by well-instructed technologists, would 

* Young men studying the technological engineering branch are ad- 
mitted to the laboratories instead of the mechanical workshops. 

f These works execute private orders to the sum of from $35,000 to 
$40,000 annually. 



APPENDIX. 383 

be of important assistance in the instruction of young peo- 
ple, even if the young people took no active part in the 
practical working of them. 

" But, in order that the pupils may derive the greatest 
possible advantage from such auxiliaries, the school pos- 
sesses, apart from the mechanical works and intended solely 
for the use of the pupils, school-workshops, a joiners' shop 
with turning-lathe, pattern-shop, metal turning, fitters' 
shop, smithy, and molding-shop. 

*^ Every one of these shops is under the management of 
a technologist, specialist, or of a skilled workman, and their 
duty is to instruct the pupils in the rudiments of mechani- 
cal labor. 

*^ Every young man becomes acquainted, by fulfilling 
the obligatory programme, with all the work of mechanical 
art, namely, turning, fitting, carpentering, and forging, in 
the school-workshops, and only then is admitted to the 
mechanical works. 

'* We shall endeavor to speak further on the system of 
teaching the arts in the mechanical workshops of the school. 

"Up to the present time, throughout the world, the 
workmen at industrial works and mills are usually self- 
taught. Any one who has himself been employed at works, 
and is familiar with the daily life of the workman in the 
different countries, must have perceived that the acquire- 
ment of knowledge and skill in any trade is to him a pro- 
cess much similar to the following : A boy of thirteen or 
fourteen years of age having entered a mechanical works to 
learn his trade, is put, during the first few years, to work 
of an entirely unproductive kind, and which has not the 
slightest relation to technics. He is made to carry water, 
sweep the workshop, crush emery, grind colors, etc. Only 
after the lapse of a few years, and, probably, thanks to acci- 
dental circumstances, a chisel or a file is put into the hands 



384: EDUCxlTION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

of the youth and he is set to perform the rudest and sim- 
plest kind of work. 

**Then, also, if he happen to have neither father nor 
brother among the workmen around him, he begins learn- 
ing his trade without a guiding hand, and thus commences 
acquiring practical knowledge and skill in his trade by ob- 
serving those about him in the workshop and by his own 
thought and calculation, and impelled by the sole desire of 
attaining, in as short a space of time as possible, the posi- 
tion of a paid hand in the works. There can be no doubt 
that under such circumstances the acquirement of skill by 
the new generation of workmen takes place in an extremely 
irrational manner, and without any system ; the amount of 
knowledge obtained depends upon accident, and the time 
thus employed is of disproportionate length. Besides this, 
there is yet another inconvenience, namely, that of sj^ecial- 
izing labor to too fractional a degree. The young work- 
man, placed accidentally at a drilling or planing machine 
or a self-acting lathe, endeavors to remain as long as pos- 
sible at his machine, encountering, it will be understood, 
no objection on the part of the heads of the workshops, since 
such specialization of labor redounds to the advantage of 
the proprietors, owing to the abundance of hands. 

*'This order of things has the deplorable result that, 
notwithstanding the long-continued stay of the young 
workmen at mechanical works, which is sometimes pro- 
longed through the major part of the years of their man- 
hood, well- taught and skilled fitters are almost ever3rwhere 
parely to be met with. This will be confirmed by all those 
constructors who demand skilled labor for the erection of 
models, and of the more or less delicately constructed in- 
struments, machines, and apparatus. 

*' During the past few years endeavors have been con- 
tinually made to open schools for the instruction of the 



APPENDIX. 385 

workmen at all works of any considerable extent. The 
subjects tauglit in these schools are free-hand and linear 
drawing, arithmetic, and many others, in the supposition 
that practical knowledge of works will be acquired in the 
works themselves. 

** From this it is imjoossible to conclude otherwise than 
that society, while taking measures to civilize the working- 
classes, gives, at the same time, no attention whatever to 
the manner in which the young workmen acquire practical 
experience in their trades at the works ; no endeavors have 
been made in that respect, and meanwhile, in our opinion, 
the question is worthy of particular attention. 

"The conclusion, however, forces itself upon us that 
this question can hardly be entered into until the young 
well-taught technologists, leaving polytechnic schools, shall 
themselves possess rational experience in practical hand- 
labor. In order that their education as specialists shall be 
full and ample, such knowledge is indispensable in the 
highest degree, though, until the present time, it has un- 
fortunately presented a prominent deficiency in their in- 
struction. Who will not admit that the knowledge of the 
manner of executing given work is a necessity to one who 
has to issue the project of such work ? 

"Acting on the principle that mechanical engineers 
and mechanical constructors, whose future activity will be 
devoted pre-eminently to mechanical works, should have 
practical experience in the mechanical arts, the Imperial 
Technical School has employed every necessary measure 
for the solution of this difficulty in the best possible man- 
ner. 

" In 1868 the school council considered it indispensable, 
in order to secure the systematic teaching of elementary 
practical work, as well as for the more convenient supervis- 
ion of the pupils while practically employed, to separate 



386 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

entirely the school-workshops from the mechanical works 
in which the orders from private individuals are executed, 
admitting pupils to the latter only when they have perfect- 
ly acquired the principles of practical labor. 

'* By the mere separation of the school- workshops from 
the mechanical works, the principal aim was, however, far 
from being attained ; it was found necessary to work out 
such a method of teaching the elementary principles of 
mechanical art as, firstly, should demand the least possible 
length of time for their acquirement ; secondly, should in- 
crease the facility of the supervision of the gradationary 
employment of the pupils ; thirdly, should impart to the , 
study itself of practical work the character of a sound, sys- 
tematic acquirement of knowledge ; and, fourthly and last- 
ly, as should facilitate the demonstration of the progress of 
every pupil at every stated time. Everybody is well aware 
that the successful study of any art whatsoever, free-hand 
or linear drawing, music, singing, painting, etc., is only 
attainable when the first attempts at any of them are strict- 
ly subject to the laws of gradation and successiveness, when 
every student adheres to a definite method or school, sur- 
mounting, little by little, and by certain degrees, the diffi- 
culties to be encountered. 

"All those arts, which we have just named, possess a 
method of study which has been well worked out and de- 
fined, because, since they have long constituted a part of 
the education of the well-instructed classes of people, 
they could not become subject to scientific analysis ; could 
not but become the objects of investigation, with a view of 
defining those conditions which might render the study 
of them as easy and regular as possible. 

" This, however, can not relate to those arts which have 
been hitherto pre-eminently followed by the common and 
imperfectly educated class of work-people, but a knowledge 



APPENDIX. 387 

of which appears at the present moment to be of impor- 
tance to the educated technologist. 

'^ These arts are : wood- turning, carpentering, metal- 
turning, fitting, and forging. From what we haye already 
said, it will not be difficult to arrive at the reason of the 
absence of a strictly systematic method for the study of 
them, nor why the actiye working out of such a method, 
without the aid of enlightened minds, may long remain 
deferred. 

"Meanwhile, the necessity of such a method, more par- 
ticularly for technical educational establishments, admits 
of not the slightest doubt, and the filling up of this want 
promises evident advantages, not only in the matter of 
scientific technical education, but also with regard to the 
practical instruction of the work-people, and consequently 
the perfection of mechanical hand-labor itself, which, from 
the introduction of specially adapted machinery, is, year 
by year, perceptibly deteriorating. 

"If we except the attempts made in France, in the 
year 1867, by the celebrated and learned mechanical engi- 
neer, A. Clair, to form a collection of models for the prac- 
tical study of the principal methods of forging and welding 
iron and steel, as well as the chief parts of joiners' work, 
and this, with a purely demonstrative aim, no one, so far 
as we are aware, has hitherto been actively engaged in the 
working out of this question in its application to the study 
of hand-labor in workshops. To the Imperial Technical 
School belongs the initiative in the introduction of a sys- 
tematic method of teaching the arts of turning, carpenter- 
ing, fitting, and forging. 

" To the knowledge and experience in these specialties 
of the gentlemen intrusted with the management of the 
school-workshops, and to their warm sympathy in the mat- 
ter of practical education, we are indebted for the drawing 



388 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

up of the programme of systematic instruction in tiie me- 
chanical arts, for its introduction in the year 1868 into the 
workshops, and also for the preparation of the necessary 
auxiliaries to study. In the year 1870, at the Exhibition 
of Manufactures at St. Petersburg, the school exhibited its 
methods of teaching mechanical arts, and from that time 
they have been introduced into all the technical schools of 
Eussia. 

^' The auxiliaries of education employed in teaching 
mechanical arts were exhibited at the International Exhi- 
bition of Vienna and that of Philadelphia, in order that 
specialists in these matters might become acquainted with 
them. 

" The auxiliaries of education appointed for the teach- 
ing of any mechanical work whatever — for example, fitters' 
work — are classed in three categories ; to the first of these 
belong the collections of instruments employed in fitters' 
work, with which the beginner must make himself perfect- 
ly familiar before entering upon work, and afterward to 
use these instruments during the execution of the work 
itself. 

*' To this category relate all those collections of models 
indispensable to the teacher of fitters' work, for the pur- 
pose of demonstration : the collection of instruments most 
in use for measuring, full size ; the collection of instru- 
ments, full size, for drilling metals ; the collection of in- 
struments, full size, for finishing, from the smithy to the 
fitting-shop inclusive. 

*' Models of files, increased to twenty-four times the 
ordinary size, for the purpose of demonstrating the surface 
of the incision ; the collection of models of instruments 
employed in cutting screws and nuts, increased six times 
ordinary size, for the study of the direction of the angles 
of incision ; the collection of models of drills, increased six 



APPENDIX. 389 

times, for the practical study of the cutting angles ; and, 
lastly, the collection of instruments and apparatus for teach- 
ing the tracing of yet unworked metal articles. We con- 
sider it our duty to draw the attention of specialists to this 
last collection, for the organization of which we are indebted 
to our skillful instructor of fitters' work, Mr. Savetkin, me- 
chanical engineer. 

^' To the second category belong the collections of mod- 
els appointed for the systematic and gradationary study of 
hand-labor in the fitter's art. These collections have the 
same signification with regard to the work of fitting as is 
allowed to scales and exercises in instruction in music. 
They are so ordered that the beginner may be enabled to 
overcome by certain gradations the dijaiculties which pre- 
sent themselves before him. It will be sufficient to glance 
at the adjoined detailed list of objects contained in these 
collections, and to examine attentively every object exhib- 
ited, to be convinced ; and if the pupil, under the guidance 
of the teacher, carefully fulfills the study of all the numbers 
embraced in the collections, or rather the educational pro- 
gramme of the art of fitting, he must inevitably, and in the 
most rational manner, render himself familiar with all the 
known practical hand-labor of this art.* 

'* Hence we arrive at the conviction, without any diffi- 
culty, that with such a system of teaching the supervision 
of the teacher over the pupils, and his observation of their 

* In the apprentice classes each student is not obliged to complete every 
number m the programme ; but the work is nevertheless so divided that he 
becomes familiar with each piece. While a student is making, for example, 
No. 2, his right-hand neighbor is working on No. 1, and his left-hand neigh- 
bor on No. 3, so that he sees how each one is made. He is obliged, more- 
over, to listen to the explanations which the instructor gives to his neigh- 
bors, and is himself afterward examined on them. The pupils in the prac- 
tical section are, however, obliged to make every piece on the list. 



390 EDUCATION IN ITS RELATION TO MANUAL INDUSTRY. 

progress, become exceedingly easy. He need only remark 
that every number of the programme is executed satisfac- 
torily by the pupils, and, putting the following one before 
him, give the requisite explanations for the succeeding 
work. 

" In such a case, the fact of a great number of pupils 
being occupied at the same time will present no great dis- 
advantage, nor will it increase the arduousness of his duty 
to any considerable degree. And, further, it will be a mat- 
ter of impossibility that a pupil who has been working dur- 
ing a few years in the workshop should fail to be able to use 
the drill, or to trace a part to be worked, though he handle 
satisfactorily the chisel or the file. 

'^ To the third category belongs the collection of those 
articles, or parts of machines, in the execution of which 
all the practical hand-labor of the fitter's art is successively 
repeated, having been acquired during the studies of the 
previous course. 

" What we have said in relation to the manner of study 
of the work of fitting must be accepted also with regard to 
the other branches of labor, namely, wood-turning, carpen- 
tering, smithy, and foundry-work. . . . 

" In conclusion, we consider it our duty to observe that 
ten years had [in 1873] already elapsed since the pro- 
grammes of instruction in the mechanical arts were intro- 
duced into the workshops of the school, and they have 
been found to attain in the most brilliant manner the aim 
proposed in their introduction. 

"Victor Della-Vos." 



INDEX 



Adam Smith's views, 50. 
Agricultural and mechanical col- 
leges, 18. 
American Institute of Instruction, 

115. 
American boys and the trades, 185- 

193. 
Angell, George S., on increase of 

crime, 345. 
Applied science, 321-328. 
Apprenticeship, 145, 178, 196, 198, 

245, 246. 
Artist and artisan, 43. 
Art bestows value on material, 54, 

55, 177. 
Arts, the fine and useful, 90, 91. 
Art of drawing, 117. 

decorative, at Pompeii, 137. 
in ceramics, 151. 
in pottery, 153. 

in school at Trenton, N. J., 153, 1 54. 
Art-education, 105. 
Art-industry, 177. 
Art, mechanic, 304, 305. 

dependent upon science, 315. 
Art, Morisco, 139. 
Art-needlework, 228-231. 
Art applied to industry and science, 

364. 
Art-schools in England, 249. 
Arts ruled by similar principles, 258. 
Auchmuty's (R. T.) contributions to 

trade-schools in New York, 222. 
Austria, industrial schools in, 28. 
Art-workmanship, its influence on 

the condition of the men, 359- 

361. 



AuguEte Comte's views, 90. 
Axioms in political economy, 48. 

Beauty a universal element, 158. 
Beautiful and the useful, 178. 
Besan9on municipal school, 14. 
Boston school committee, 292. 
British art-education, 36. 

artisans sent to the Continent in 
1867, 36. 
British increase inart productions, 40. 

art-schools, 39. 

Clarke's (John S.) views, 115. 
Classical learning, 334-336. 
Chemistry in the art of dyeing, 156. 
Children, early education of, 2. 
Cincinnati School of Design, 244. 
City and Guilds of London Institute, 

319. 
Cramming process, 357. 
the antidote, 359. 

Decoration and ornament, 126. 
Denmark, industrial school in, 28. 
Drawing, applications of, 132, 133. 

to colored patterns, 155. 

a practical art, 157. 

a required study, 159, 160. 

in Boston schools, 162. 

present system of teaching, 162- 
164. 

ornament and design in, 164, 165. 

mechanical, 165-168. 

importance, by Prof. Kriisi, 168. 

as a means of intellectual disci- 
pline, 170-173. 



392 



INDEX. 



Drawing, report of Royal Commis- 
sioners (English), 173. 

law in Massachusetts, 159. 

in the order of studies, 117. 

as an art, 117-174. 

indispensable to useful art, 306. 
Dwight School, Boston, 227. 

Ecole Municipal d'Apprentis, 13. 

des Arts et Metiers, 22. 
Education, duty of Government, 112- 
114. 
equality of, 5. 

by lessons of experience, 101, 102. 
of Indians at Hampton and Car- 
lisle, 355. 
national systems of, 336-338. 
at Athens, Rome,Germany, France, 

Scotland, England, 336-338. 
need of practical, 106. 
suggested by the senses and man's 
physical structure, 109-111. 
England, education of her working- 
men, 35. 
Eye, culture of the, 6, 96. 

Finsbury Technical College, 319. 
France, industrial history of, 10-12. 
Government aid, 25. 

Germany, industrial schools in, 26. 
Gladstone's eulogium on Wedgwood, 

148, 149. 
Government aid, 112. 
Great Britain, commerce of, 12. 
Greek and Greece, 92-98. 

Hand-culture, 6, 8, 96. 
Hand-tools and hand-skill, 73, 313. 
Holyoke College, 94. 

Ideas, want of power in mere, 5. 
Idleness a source of vice and crime, 

344-348. 
Illinois Industrial University, 60. 
Immigration, 141-147. 
Industrial education, 1. 
Industrial school — is it adapted to 

the United States ? 218-220. 
Industrial schools first in France, 13. 



Industrial schools at Besan9on, 14. 

of the Christian Brothers, 15. 

of MM. Chaix & Co., 16. 

at Creuzot, 18. 

at Neuwelt, 19. 

at Mulhouse, 20. 

at Limoges, 21. 

in Europe, 198-218. 

moral influence of, 193-195. 

in the United States, 221-247. 

in New York city, 222. 

in Trenton, N. J., 228. 

in Montciair, N. J., 231-236. 

Spring Garden Institute, 241. 

in West Washington, D. C, 243. 

the working-man's best hope, 365. 

classified, 272-274. 

of S. P. Buggies, 274-277. 
Industry, moral influence of, 347- 
350. 

public instruction in, 249. 

mode of instruction, 261-263. 
Industrial science, 321-328. 
Inventions and inventive faculties of 
Americans, 331-334. 

Jenkins, Professor, address on the 
subject of apprenticeship, 182. 

Labor, skilled, from abroad, 140. 

value of skilled, 146. 

subdivision of, 245, 330. 
Lasell Seminary, 225. 
Language and thought, 4. 
Leland's (C. G.) school for art-work, 

236. 
Lessons of things, 4, 101. 

MacAlister's views and address, 251, 

279. 
Machinery, the use of, 307-312. 
influence of, 339. 
and science, 340. 
Magnus, Philip, on use of tools, 

257. 
Manual training in public schools, 
257, 258, 272-320. 
expense of same, 296-300. 
Massachusetts Institute of Technol- 
ogy, 64. 



INDEX. 



393 



Mechanical skill, 343. 

drawing, 165. 
Mental training, 300. 
Mission of the physical organs, 4. 

Netherlands, industrial schools in, 

28. 
New England, 55. 

Objections stated, 253-256. 
Outis on modern education, 8. 



Palissy, Bernard, 14V, 150, 151. 
Parton's (James) views, 188. 
Philosophy and manual skill, 3. 
Potter's art, 147-156. 
Porcelain, American, 151-155. 

Richards's (Zalmon) views, 349. 
Runkle's (Professor) views, 294. 
Russian industrial education, 29. 
Russia, schools at capitals of, 30, 32, 

48. 
Russian plan, 72. 

appendix second, explaining the 
same, 375. 

Schools of art and design, 104. 

drawing in, 118. 

of industrial art-work at Philadel- 
phia, 236. 

for manual training, 108. 

cost of supporting, 301. 

Professor Runkle's views of, 
302. 

sewing in, 228, 236, 241. 

statistics of, 176. 

progressive, 351. 

British report on the same, 351. 
Senses — five in number, 9. 
Science applied to the useful arts, 

321-328. 
Smith's (Walter) views, 291. 
South Kensington Museum, London, 

36. 
Spring Garden Institute, 241. 
Statistics of crime, 345. 

18 



Steele's (E. T.) views, 269. 
Sweden, industrial schools in, 28. 

Tariff commission, 143. 
Technical education, 79. 

schools, 76-78. 
Trade, property in a, 180-184. 
Trades easily learned, 258, 259. 
Trade-schools in New York, 222-224. 

in Montclair, N. J., 231. 

Trenton, N. J., 225. 
Trades-unions, 144. 

and apprenticeship, 179-184. 
Trenton, N. J., strike at, 153. 

United States, industrial resources 
of, 45-53. 

products of, 47. 

industrial education in, 45. 

cheap lands in, 49. 

technological schools in, 63. 

public-school system of, 99, 100, 
103. 

school statistics in, 176. 
University extension scheme, 183. 

Victor Cousin, views of, 90. 

Walker's (Francis A.) views, 66. 
Washington University Training- 

School, 74, 75. 
Wedgwood, Josiah, 147. 
White House table-service, 140. 
White, E. E., on manual training, 

251. 
White's (R. G.) views, 284. 
Women, higher education for, 81-93. 
professions and trades open to, 

84-86. 
co-education of, 93. 
industrial education of, 88. 
Emily Faithful, views of, 87. 
Workshops and high-schools, 317, 
318. 
and instruction, 328, 329. 

Appendix First, 367. 
Appendix Second, 375. 



31^77-2 



